THEATRE REVIEW: Ringwood players’ ‘Follies’

Posted on April 20, 2008 by admin

By Ray Bennett

To stage a Stephen Sondheim musical gives pause to the best in the business so top marks to the Ringwood Musical & Dramatic Society in Hampshire for tackling “Follies” and carrying it off with flourish.

One of hundreds of regional theater troupes around the country, RMDS seldom shrinks from a challenge under president John Truman, and veteran director Pete Talman made a bold decision to present the show in the round.

Cast member Julian Peckham observed in the program that “the show has proved a big challenge for all: from production crew to choreographer (Cindy Wischhusen) and musical director (Jane Lee), and not least the performers.” All the more reason to celebrate their success.

The cast featured RMDS leading ladies going back to the 1950s including Annette Arnold, Poppy Garvey, Rosemary Guy, Anne Maynard and Anita Rosser. They each had some time in the spotlight and, boy, did they deliver.

The show tells of two loverlorn couples as youngsters and in later life. My brother Richard Bennett and his son Ali Bennett, played Ben Stone. Chris Grant and Victoria Richardson were Phyllis Stone. Chrissie Peckham and Samantha Laurilla played Sally Plummer and Julian Peckham and Luke Beavis were Buddy Plummer. They were all splendid and so were the rest of the large cast.

Here’s more about RMDS

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FILM REVIEW: Daniel Craig in ‘Flashbacks of a Fool’

Posted on April 20, 2008 by admin

'Flashbacks of a Fool' 2008

By Ray Bennett

LONDON — A burned-out movie star recalls the youthful trauma that drove him away from home in “Flashbacks of a Fool,” which despite a clunky title and a conventional structure proves a welcome diversion from 007 for Daniel Craig.

Debunking his own superstar image, Craig plays Joe Scot, a Hollywood hunk whose taste for high-priced drugs, liquor and hookers is ruining his career. When he gets word of the death of a childhood friend, he swims into the ocean and floats not only out to sea but also back in time.

Set in England but filmed on the west coast of Cape Town in South Africa, the film has attractive scenery and appealing players, and new writer-director Baillie Walsh, a music video veteran, delivers surprises amid the flashbacks. Craig’s name and a soundtrack that features Roxy Music and David Bowie should help drive the picture to rewarding if not spectacular boxoffice returns.

Harry Eden plays the actor as a young man and it’s a good piece of casting as he not only looks as if he might grow up to resemble Craig but also he has some of the James Bond star’s charisma. The story is of young Joe, his best buddy Boots (Max Deacon) and their rites of passage involving the winsomely innocent Ruth (Felicity Jones) and the sinfully seductive Evelyn (Jodhi May).

Walsh creates a credible little seaside community with Joe’s widowed mother (Olivia Williams), sister Peggy (Helen McCrory) and a bothersome but kindly old neighbor (Miriam Karlin). Craig features in the first and last acts showing the movie star’s corruption in the beginning and his attempt at redemption at the end, and he does a solid job. The middle act is all about the kids, and Eden does well in the company of two fine young actresses, Jones and May.

The dramatic event at the core of the story is staged powerfully. While the film leans toward sentimentality, the strength of the performers makes it palatable.

Cast: Daniel Craig; Ophelia Franklin; Harry Eden; Olivia Williams; Helen McCrory; Jodhi May; Keeley Hawes; Emilia Fox; Mark Strong; James D’Arcy; Claire Forlani; Felicity Jones; Max Deacon; Director, screenwriter: BaillieWalsh; Director of photography: John Mathieson; Production designer: Laurence Dorman; Music: Richard Hartley; Costume designer: Stevie Stewart; Editor: Struan Clay; Producers: Lene Bausager, Damon Bryant, Genevieve Hofmeyr, Claus Clausen; Executive producers: Daniel Craig, Robert Mitchell, Sean Ellis, Brian Avery, Susanne Bohnet, Jay Jopling Production: Left Turn Films; No MPAA rating; Running time, 113 minutes.

This review appeared in The Hollywood Reporter.

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THEATRE REVIEW BRIEF: Peter Gill’s ‘Small Change’

Posted on April 18, 2008 by admin

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By Ray Bennett

LONDON — Peter Gill’s play “Small Change,” a tale of two men’s boyhood friendship and their missed opportunity for love in a working-class area of Wales in the 1950s, has evocative moments but is rendered in a singular voice and becomes too dense to be engaging.

Michael Grandage directs Luke Evans and Matt Ryan (pictured), Sue Johnston and Lindsey Coulsen in a story of lost passion.

Written in 1976 and revived under the playwright’s direction at the Donmar Warehouse, the play features four characters with four chairs on a bare stage. Two mothers and two sons address the audience, painting pictures of harsh times when poverty strikes minds as well as bellies.

 

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Charlton Heston dies

Posted on April 6, 2008 by admin

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By Ray Bennett

Charlton Heston, who has died aged 83, carved out an honorable place for himself in Hollywood history with his many epics and science-fiction pictures, but too often his sense of humor deserted him and pomposity won out.

I interviewed him on the set of the “Dynasty” spinoff “The Colbys” (pictured below with Stephanie Beacham) in 1985, he told me he had prepared a back story for his character, a stereotype rich man in soap operas of the day.

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“Jason Colby,” he said sonorously, “believes that at the end of each day he should enter his house justified.”

Which might have been fine if he’d acknowledged his debt to N. B. Stone and his cowriters who had given the line to Joel McCrea’s dying character Steve Judd in the celebrated 1962 Sam Peckinpah western “Ride the High Country.”

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Despite his later politics, you couldn’t help liking Heston as a screen icon. In last year’s “Man in the Chair,” Christopher Plummer’s old-time gaffer is watching “Touch of Evil” (above with Orson Welles) and cries out, “You never could act wearing pants, Chuckles.” But that wasn’t always so.

Heston made some pretty good westerns including Jerry Hopper’s “Pony Express” (1953) as Buffalo Bill Cody; William Wyler’s 1958 epic “The Big Country” with Gregory Peck; Sam Peckinpah’s ill-fated “Major Dundee” (1965); and probably best of all Tom Gries’ fine 1968 cowboy tale “Will Penny” (below) as part of a terrific ensemble featuring Joan Hacket, Donald Pleasance, Lee Majors, Bruce Dern, Ben Johnson, Slim Pickens and the great Anthony Zerbe.

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The actor wasn’t entirely without a sense of humor. He definitely needed one to take on “The Colbys” even with Barbara Stanwyck, Beacham, Ricardo Montalban, Katharine Ross and Emma Samms.

He showed it best, however, in a wickedly sly performance as Cardinal Richelieu in Richard Lester’s splendid “The Three Musketeers” and “The Four Musketeers,” although you wonder if Lester hadn’t conned him the way Wyler, Gore Vidal and Stephen Boyd evidently did on “Ben-Hur.”

The way Vidal tells it in his brilliant memoir “Palimpsest,” he rewrote the script to highlight the homoerotic undertones in the relationship of the heroic Ben-Hur and his childhood friend Messala played by Boyd. Heston, apparently, never got the nuances and he later chose to deny that Vidal had anything to do with the screenplay. He had the last laugh, though, when he picked up the 1960 Academy Award for best actor (pictured below with Simone Signoret, who won for best actress in “Room at the Top”).

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Here’s Heston’s obituary in the New York Times, and more about ‘Palimpsest’

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Above all, life

Posted on April 5, 2008 by admin

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THEATRE REVIEW: Jeremy Irons in ‘Never So Good’

Posted on April 4, 2008 by admin

'Never So Good' 2008

By Ray Bennett

LONDON – Jeremy Irons gives a masterful performance as an old-school politician grappling with a rapidly changing world in “Never So Good” at London’s National Theatre, but the play itself offers biography more than great drama.

Irons plays Harold Macmillan, who was the British prime minister from 1957-63 when the Beatles and Swinging London were starting to change the world. Macmillan was wounded five times in World War I, survived a plane crash in World War II, connived with U.S. President Eisenhower to end the 1956 Middle East War over the Suez Canal and was there when President Kennedy faced down the Soviets over the Cuban missile crisis.

But he is best known for having to resign from office following what became tagged as the Profumo Affair when the U.K. minister of war became embroiled in sexual shenanigans with a woman named Christine Keeler, who also was sleeping with a Russian spy. The tale was the basis of Michael Caton-Jones’ 1989 film “Scandal,” starring Joanne Whalley as Keeler and Ian McKellen as Profumo.

Like Winston Churchill, Macmillan had an American mother, but his was a strident capitalist who never believed her son would be a success at anything other than in the family business of publishing. But the first war changed the young man forever, and playwright Howard Brenton keeps two Macmillans onstage throughout the play, with the younger idealist (Pip Carter) a constant goad for the older pragmatist.

Brenton frames the production with the elderly Macmillan reflecting on his life as his comfortably upper-class existence was cruelly interrupted by the brutalities of war. But his conscience was forever struck by the bravery and suffering of the working-class soldiers.

Director Howard Davies uses dancing interludes to mark the changing decades, and he stages some spectacular pyrotechnics for the battle and crash scenes. Anna Carteret as Macmillan’s bullying mother and Anna Chancellor (pictured with Irons) as his unfaithful wife make telling contributions; Ian McNeice is a colorful Churchill.

Irons is superb at conveying the man’s shifting emotions, wily political instincts and considerable sadness and regret. He captures his grave dignity and indignation over being ridiculed by the English satirists of the 1960s when the scandal breaks.

It’s instructive, however, that the funniest lines in the play are quotes from comedian Peter Cook, who lampooned Macmillan mercilessly as being out of touch even in his presence. Despite Irons’ sympathetic performance, the play does not succeed in proving Cook wrong.

Venue: National Theatre, runs through May 24; Cast: Harold Macmillan: Jeremy Irons; Pip Carter; Anna Carteret; Anna Chancellor; Ian McNeice; Anthony Calf; Robert Glenister; Terrence Hardiman; Peter Forbes; Clive Francis; Playwright: Howard Brenton; Director: Howard Davies; Set designer: Vicki Mortimer; Lighting designer: Mark Henderson; Music: Dominic Muldowney; Choreographer: Lynne Page; Sound designer: Paul Arditti.

This review appeared in The Hollywood Reporter.

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‘Carmen’ casts a spell at the Royal Opera House

Posted on March 29, 2008 by admin

By Ray Bennett

A long overdue visit to London’s Royal Opera House Friday was a revelation. The vast gorgeous white complex, overhauled in the 1990s, is breathtaking even before you enter the beautiful auditorium. The prices are jaw-dropping but when the production is as good as the current “Carmen,” the rewards are enormous.

Home to the Royal Opera, the Royal Ballet and the Orchestra of the Royal Opera House, the Covent Garden edifice is a national treasure and well worth a visit if you possibly can. Here’s an except from a review of “Carmen” by Hilary Finch in the Guardian.

“Both the Spanish mezzo Nancy Fabiola Herrera and the Argentine tenor Marcelo Alvarez have the measure of their relationship – they have sung the roles together already at the Met. Herrera’s high vocal intelligence is the equal of the cunning of this Carmen.

Her words are threaded in taut, sprung rhythms within an entirely secure and eloquent vocal range. And Alvarez … sang with strength, almost total focus and a moving sense of helpless emotional disarray.”

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Actor Richard Widmark dies at 93

Posted on March 28, 2008 by admin

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By Ray Bennett

LONDON – Richard Widmark, who has died aged 93, made an indelible impression as a psychopathic criminal in Henry Hathaway’s 1947 Victor Mature vehicle “Kiss of Death”. It won the Minnesota-born actor an Academy Award nomination as best supporting actor and kicked off a long career playing criminals and cops on America’s mean streets.

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My favorite memories of Widmark with his killer smile and deceptively sly line readings, however, are in Westerns starting with William A. Wellman’s “Yellow Sky” (1948, above) in which he competes with Gregory Peck for the charms of Anne Baxter. He’s also outstanding in three Edward Dmytryk Westerns – “Broken Lance” (1954) with Spencer Tracy and Robert Wagner, “Warlock” (1959) with Henry Fonda (pictured with Widmark below) and Anthony Quinn, and “Alvarez Kelly” (1966) with William Holden.

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Widmark made “Backlash” (1956) and “The Law and Jake Wade” (1958) for John Sturges, the latter starring Robert Taylor and the redheaded Canadian beauty Patricia Owens. John Ford directed him in ‘Two Rode Together’ (1961) with James Stewart and “Cheyenne Autumn” (1964) but while Ford shot the opening Civil War episode of the 1962 Cinerama epic “How the West Was Won,” Widmark is in the terrific railroad sequence directed by George Marshall.

The blond actor’s performance as Jim Bowie is the best thing in John Wayne’s bloated “The Alamo” (1960) with Wayne and Laurence Harvey (pictured top) and he has a good time with Kirk Douglas and Robert Mitchum in Andrew V. McLaglen’s “The Way West” (1967), which also sees Sally Field’s feature film debut.

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I have a soft spot for his stab at romantic comedy opposite Doris Day (pictured above) in “The Tunnel of Love” (1958) directed by Gene Kelly and for his wonderfully droll performance as a colorfully ruined dentist in Richard Quine’s “The Moonshine War” (1970). An acquired taste, the latter is an oddball picture, scripted by Elmore Leonard from his own novel, that also features one of the rare movie outings by the great Patrick McGoohan (pictured with Widmark below) as a duplicitous ex-revenue agent.

Moonshine war x325Widmark never quite made it to the top flight of Hollywood leading men but he ranks with the likes of Mitchum, Robert Ryan, James Mason and Jack Warden as performer who always make even bad pictures worth seeing, which is more than you can say of most.

Here’s Widmark’s obituary in the New York Times

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THEATRE REVIEW: ‘God of Carnage’

Posted on March 28, 2008 by admin

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By Ray Bennett

A civilized meeting of two married couples to discuss the misbehavior of one of their children descends into an evening of virtual hand-to-hand combat in a star-laden production of Yasmina Reza’s new play “God of Carnage” at London’s Gielgud Theatre.

Ralph Fiennes, Tamsin Greig, Janet McTeer and Ken Stott play middle-class Parisians whose attempt to find out why one of their sons struck the other with a stick in a playground encounter begins with polite reserve and ends with blood on the floor.

The production is from the team that produced the 1994 theatrical hit “Art,” which ran on Broadway for 18 months and won the Tony for best play. Christopher Hampton again translates Yeza’s words, with direction by Matthew Warchus.

“Carnage” is entertaining and insightful with fine performances by the cast of four, but its examination of middle-class marriage and the thin veneer of civilization that holds society together fails to apply the scalpel where it would truly hurt. Edward Albee’s George and Martha would have wiped the floor with this lot.

Alain (Fiennes) and Annette (Greig) at first appear keen to address the concerns of Veronique (McTeer) and Michel (Stott) over why their 11-year-old Ferdinand whacked his schoolmate Bruno in the mouth, causing the loss of a tooth or two.

It becomes clear, however, that lawyer Alain sees all children, including his son, as savages and wishes merely to pay for orthodontics and put the matter to rest. Veronique, a liberal author who writes about suffering in Africa, has something more in mind involving apologies and punishment.

Annette, who says she’s in wealth management, and Michel, who runs a domestic hardware company, are supportive and conciliatory at the outset, each aware of the potential for sparks from their respective spouses.

But small haggling over whether Ferdinand was “armed with” or “furnished with” a stick or whether Bruno was merely bruised or disfigured for life lead to more serious disagreements until all-out war is declared.

There are some very funny lines, and all four performers delight in the power of well-constructed dialogue to both soothe and draw blood. At the end, the hypocrisies of both couples are laid bare, but at 90-minutes, the play hasn’t enough time to go very deep and ends up offering neither catharsis nor harmony.

Venue: Gielgud Theatre, runs through June 14; Cast: Ralph Fiennes; Tamsin Greig; Janet McTeer; Ken Stott; Playwright: Yasmina Reza; Translated by: Christopher Hampton; Director: Matthew Warchus; Set designer: Mark Thompson; Lighting designer: Hugh Vanstone; Music: Gary Yershon; Sound designer: Simon Baker; Produced by David Pugh & Dafydd Rogers.

This review appeared in The Hollywood Reporter; Photo: Alastair Muir

 

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THEATRE REVIEW: ‘Jersey Boys’

Posted on March 20, 2008 by admin

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By Ray Bennett

LONDON –”Jersey Boys,” the pop musical about Frankie Valli and the Four Seasons that has had a long Tony Award-winning Broadway run, finally made it to London’s West End with a British cast and it’s great finally to see what all the fuss is about.

Frankie Valli and Bob Gaudio from the real Four Seasons were on hand Tuesday night at the Prince Edward Theatre for the London first night and their appearance topped a great night with a packed house on their feet for the Broadway transfer.

The show started off at the La Jolla Playhouse in California, which has been headed for 25 years by two-time Tony Award-winning director Des McAnuff. Named recently as co-artistic director of the Stratford Festival in Canada, McAnuff’s track record includes Roger Miller’s “Big River,” Pete Townshend’s “The Who’s Tommy” and Randy Newman’s wonderful but ignored “Faust.”

Marshall Brickman and Rick Elice constructed a sturdy platform to tell the story of four kids from the neighborhood who were determined to escape the clutches of poverty and crime. Not entirely to escape, as the mob’s tentacles intruded along the way to make life difficult, but to win fame and riches.

Director McAnuff and the rest of the Broadway creative team are all on board and they’ve found a terrific cast of U.K. performers to carry the torch. Ryan Molloy’s grasp of the Valli sound is uncanny and he is able to convey not only the growth of the character but also the increasing richness of his vocals.

Stephen Ashfield is engagingly bluff as Bob Gaudio, the songwriter who came along at just the right time to carry the boys to the top of the pop world. Philip Bulcock captures the insouciance of Nick Massi, whose appetite for pop glory waned along the way. And Glenn Carter gives tough guy Tommy DeVito, who pushed the group forward but gave in too easily to the temptations along the way, the right degree of swagger.

Like most jukebox musicals, the show scrimps on scenery and choreography but that doesn’t matter as it has some smart and informative video and cartoon projections. The focus is tight on the band members and the drama is enhanced greatly by the lighting design of deserved Tony winner Howard Binkley.

Above all, the 33 songs with all the hits including “Sherry,” “Big Girls Don’t Cry,” “Walk Like a Man,” “Can’t Take My Eyes Off You,” “Working My Way Back to You” and “Rag Doll” are put across in sensational fashion.

Some critics here wonder if the backstory will interest U.K. theatergoers but whereas many couldn’t tell Arkansas from Utah, New Jersey is Sinatra, Nicholson and Springsteen. They know.

Venue: Prince Edward Theatre, runs through Oct. 18; Cast: Ryan Molloy; Stephen Ashfield; Philip Bulcock; Glenn Carter; Simon Adkins; Suzy Bastone; Michelle Francis; Jye Frasca; Stuart Milligan; Book: Marshall Brickman & Rick Elice; Music: Bob Gaudio; Lyrics: Bob Crewe; Director: Des McAnuff; Choreographer: Sergio Trujillo; Musical supervisor: Ron Melrose; Scenic designer: Klara Zieglerova; Costume designer: Jess Goldstein; Lighting designer: Howard Binkley; Sound designer: Steve Canyon Kennedy; Projection design: Michael Clark.

A version of this review appeared in The Hollywood Reporter.

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