Stage Beauty
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Movie Reviews of Stage Beauty
Movie Review: It is the cause!
Summary: 5 Stars
One of the reasons I enjoy teaching 18th century British Literature is that it includes an add-on: the Restoration, which kicks off in 1660 and, in literary terms, is usually said to run to the end of the 17th century. What a crazy-quilt of a period! The return to England of Charles II from exile in France marked the close of the Commonwealth era, when both Christmas and the public performance of plays were outlawed. What really sets this period in British literature apart is the development of Restoration theatre, a withering, yet unabashedly hilarious, look at manners and mores among the upper classes that anticipates opera buffa. It's a little hard to reconcile the history of the period with all that happens in "Stage Beauty," but Richard Eyre's film (screenplay by playwright Jeffrey Hatcher) is a brilliantly executed fantasy, centering on the real-life actor Ned Kynaston, who played women's roles at a time when women were banned from appearing on the stage. In the film, he has a female dresser, Maria, who is acting Desdemona illegally and who precipitates an end to Ned's career when she suggests to the King that actresses should be allowed, as they already were in France, to perform in public. There are some slow moments here, but the action always picks up whenever Zoe Tapper, as Charles II's mistress Nell Gwynn, flounces onto the screen. The period reenactment is meticulous (although Rupert Everett as the king puts one more in mind of the Fonz), but the point is to examine two approaches to acting: the kind of declamatory style that was popular in Shakespeare's day (and against which Hamlet warned the players) might have seemed appropriate to an all-male theatre, but a more realistic approach to acting, one that threatened the fourth-wall convention of indoor playhouses, was on the horizon. All right, so maybe it would be another quarter-century before it became the norm, but the lesson is an instructive one. When Ned and Maria face off as Othello and Desdemona, neither audience--onscreen or off--knows quite what to expect. Billy Crudup is a bit skittish as Ned, and Clare Danes needs to lighten up, but their characters are well-written and always fascinating, especially in the climactic scene. And fans of Restoration literature (there are a few of us left, aren't there?) will be pleased to note the appearance of Samuel Pepys, the great diarist and reporter of such events as the Great Fire of London, as played by Hugh Bonneville, in a supporting role.Movie Review: An Excellent Movie of Gender and the Theater
Summary: 5 Stars
It's London in the 1660's when women were forbidden by law to appear on the stage. Female roles were played by male actors who were raised and trained for this specialty. The greatest of them is Ned Kynaston (Billy Crudup) and we meet him on stage while he's playing Desdemona's death scene. Maria (Claire Danes), his dresser, wants two things...to be an actor and to have Ned. When Charles II issues a decree that henceforth women only may play women's roles, Ned's world crashes to the ground. As he says, "Where's the art in a woman playing a woman?" Maria's world changes just as radically.
This is a terrific movie about theater and gender. Kynaston is a man who plays women who now must learn to play men. He's gay, he's straight, he's bi, and he doesn't think seriously about all that...only that he must act. Maria is a woman who wants to play women but only knows how to play men playing women because that's all she's ever seen. Eventually, Ned shows Maria how to be a woman playing a woman, and Maria shows Ned how to be a man playing a man. And while Ned's nature may not make him a candidate for heterosexual monogamy, it's likely that Ned and Maria will enjoy each other's pleasure and company for a while, as well as new fame. "Who are you now?" she asks him, after their triumph on the stage, she as Desdemona to his Othello. "I don't know, I don't know," he says, and they both laugh and kiss.
Crudup does an extraordinary job. He plays Desdemona in full costume, he plays Othello, he plays bi, he plays straight, he plays gay. He's believable. He has the looks, the masculinity and the screen presence to become one of Hollywood's pretty star leads like Tom and Brad and Leo, but he spends his time acting in New York and taking quirky screen roles like this one.
Claire Danes brings innocence, ambition and directness to her part, and is excellent.
The movie also is full of the kind of memorable character actors that only Britain seems to produce, such as Tom Wilkinson, Edward Fox and Rupert Everett. Richard Griffiths almost steals the show as an obese, condescending, malicious, superficial and lascivious old noble who becomes Maria's sponsor and winds up helping both Maria and Ned.
Movie Review: Highly entertaining period drama!
Summary: 5 Stars
I found Stage Beauty to be a wonderfully moving story about our places in life, the roles we play, and how love brings us closer to who we really are. Others have delved into the plot and basic storyline, so I'll skip that and go straight into what I thought of the film.
I found the story to be that of two kindred spirits bringing out the best in each other. In both cases, both Maria and Ned bring something out of each other that they never knew existed. He brings out her dormant acting talent, and she brings out a side of him he could never pursue or express when he was playing female roles. I loved how this was a story of a fully grown man trying to figure out his own identity--this isn't some teenage coming-of-age story. I don't believe Ned's problem was as simple as having to choose a role (act like a man or act like a woman), he had to go beyond gender roles and transcend them to realize who he was as a person, and Maria facillitated this process.
Billy Crudup is fantastic. I can't believe he did not receive an oscar nod. This film works because of him. The role of Ned Kynaston is such a difficult one to play, but he made it his own. Claire Danes, interestingly, plays the 'guy,' in a sense. Like Kirsten Dunst in Wimbledon, it's the women who come and help the guys out, not the other way around like in traditional romances. There is chemistry between the two actors, so it makes the movie that much more enjoyable to watch.
The climactic scene was absolutely fantastic. I was on the edge of my seat. The movie was deeply satisfying, and ranks as one of my favorite films I've seen within the last year, if not the favorite. I actually prefer this to Shakespeare in Love, which was sort of a miss for me. Stage Beauty, however, is a full-on hit.
Movie Review: Victor/Victoria
Summary: 5 Stars
Director Richard Eyre has said that Billy Crudup (as a bi-sexual cross dressing actor) was his first of three choices to play Ned Kynaston, a famous "actress" in 1600's London: the others were Robert Downey and Jude Law.
At a time when women were banned from appearing on the stage, Kynaston was the Sarah Bernhardt/John Barrymore of his/her generation. Then Charles II decreed that, on the English stage, women will henceforth be played by women: in this case Clare Danes, who is Kynaston's dresser.
This role reversal, gender bending theme is central to Eyre's mise-en-scene: can men who are comfortable playing women ever be comfortable playing men again? And when women are introduced onto the stage, will they be accepted playing women when the public is used to seeing men playing them?
There are many allusions to Kabuki and Chinese Theater, in which, to this day men play women on the stage. But is "playing/portraying" a woman the same as a woman playing herself? And once the natural order of things is brought back to normal, how will the public react?
Eyre has composed a gorgeous film full of illusion and magic: all things necessary for good theater. Crudup is a marvel as Kynaston: conflicted, feeling used, feeling that the rug has been pulled out from under his life and more importantly his career, he nonetheless prevails, pulls it together and accepts his fate.
"Stage Beauty" is about adaptation, about change, about finding a new place in which we feel comfortable. It's also ultimately about Identity: who we really are as opposed to who we think we are and who we want to be.
Movie Review: Excellent movie
Summary: 5 Stars
I was not expecting much from this movie and was pleasantly surprised by it. At times a period drama, at times a farce, at times a romantic movie, it kept on taking me deeper and deeper into the characters and into the story. Granted the history within it might not be that accurate, but as the director of the picture says in the DVD features, historical accuracy was not what was aimed for here. The history of men in theater playing female roles just provided a perfect backdrop for exploring a vast range of emotions and feelings, digging a little into the subtlety and complexity of human nature.
I loved both leads here and the cast in general. I was very taken aback to find out that the male lead was American as he sounded impeccable in his British accent. I was also taken aback to discover I have already seen and loved this actor in two other movies: Waking Dead and Almost Famous, two movies I also enjoyed very much, in part because of this very talented male actor. He is very versatile and radiates on screen.
As far as the story goes, I loved how it evolved but was particularly taken by the ending: the rehearsal and final staging of the play with the male lead playing Othello was fantastic and gave me goose bumps.
Also very mellow soothing music, nice sets, great costumes accentuating the "farce" moments of the picture and a delightful performance of Rupert Everett as the King. I wouldn't have cast him in this role, but I would have been wrong, as he is indeed quite perfect for it.
An all round positive and moving experience.