Phil’s Page November 2010

Forty years ago (God, I am old), “The Subject was Roses” with Jack Albertson, who a few people remembered from vaudeville, Irene Dailey, who was Dan’s sister (and if you don’t know Dan Dailey, stop reading now) and Martin Sheen, who was a complete unknown, opened on Broadway to excellent reviews and almost closed because no one came until the producers decided to throw a lot of money into an ad campaign which paid off and people started coming and then lots of people started coming and the play won a Pulitzer and made lots and lots of money. Because the damn play worked and it was beautifully done and word got out. I’m not so sure that could happen today. No matter how wonderful what was going on onstage happened to be. I believe you would need a star. Whatever that is.

Indeed, how is the word to be defined? Several years ago the film director John Waters was looking for money to make a  film he had written and proposed to direct. The lead role was a handsome young man in his early twenties. Waters said he was talking to two different finance companies, both European, and they each had given him a list of five young actors who would be acceptable to them as choices to star in the movie. Not a single actor’s name had made both lists. So who is a star is a highly subjective thing. And who decides such things? It used to be us, the public. Now it is producers and film studios and television networks guessing who we will pay to see act. It used to be actors who gave us an experience who we called stars. It had nothing to do with how they looked. Was Laurette Taylor a beauty? Is there a Broadway producer alive today would allow such a plain looking woman as Kim Stanley to play Cheri in “Bus Stop”? (The Marilyn Monroe part?? No, actually: the Kim Stanley part.) Is there anyone alive today who can give us the experience that Kim Stanley gave audiences when she played Cheri? A few. Damn few. How often do we get to see them?

How did this happen? A few years ago, there was a movie called “Napoleon Dynamite” which cost 400,000 to make and grossed 38 million and it did not have one name actor. It had actors with names and it was a hysterically funny and perfectly cast film. And it is famous for defying all of the wizards at Netflix who cannot figure out which sort of person will like it. Nextflix is pretty good at predicting what you will like what based on what you have liked in the past. There are all of these little indicators they use – subject matter, body count, female nudity, male nudity and…stars. You liked “North by Northwest”? You will like “Notorious.” Well, sure. But what if there were no stars as in the case of “Napoleon Dynamite”? Well, you would have to look hard to find such a thing. But you see, “Napoleon Dynamite” is just plain funny. It works. It’s not even a genre flick. Not really. What genre? It’s simply good. It’s excellent. People like it. What sort of people? Hard to say. People who like things that work. Which turns out to be an awful lot of people. Though the presence of one of these over-priced performers turned demigod has proven over and over again to be no guarantee whatsoever that people will respond favorably at the box office – ever see Paul Newman in “The Private War of Harry Frigg?” (I didn’t think so) – the need to have at least one bold faced name in the cast of anything which uses actors has only increased. Now I don’t mean to pick on Paul Newman. Hell, he was one of the good guys. But he was also a star and he had to keep his face in front of the pubic so he made a number of bad movies knowing that they were bad because he was Paul Newman and people needed to be reminded of that. Or so said his agent or his PR firm or his lawyer or his accountant or the movie studio that’s going to want him in six months. Paul Newman tying himself up in a play? OMG. Think of the money all those satellites would lose. But wouldn’t it have been fortunate for us if he had done a play or two when there were no good film scripts to tantalize him? For him as well. It might have fed him. Ever see a first class actor returning to the stage after a decade or two of film and TV? Not quite the power we remembered.

Movies are cast a little differently than plays, of course. Jennifer Aniston and Audrey Tautou could conceivably be on the same wish list when casting a part in a movie. I doubt they would be competing for the same role in a play. Movies are all about who’s available, who’s hot, who’s bankable? Plays are more concerned with who is right for the part. Or they used to be. Is Denzel Washing really right for Troy Maxson in “Fences”? You know, he really isn’t. God bless him for wanting to do theatre and he did fine but basically, he was there to put customers in the seats. I should probably take that out. (But I won’t.) Would I say the same thing about Viola Davis? Of course not because she was not a star. But she is now. Will I say the same thing about her the next time out when she is billed first over the title? Probably not. She’s a genius, what can I tell you? But you can bet the star making machinery is in place to build the Viola Davis brand. And it probably doesn’t include too many return visits to the stage. We can pray Viola doesn’t let that happen but who could blame her for wanting some payback for the years of having to live off the money a non-star makes in the theatre or the money a non-star makes in two scene movie roles, or the times she heard she wasn’t pretty enough or was too theatrical or people just didn’t want to see her? She has to want to revel in some of the earthly rewards there are to be had out there. She knows she’s a genius and she has been made to wait a long time. Why couldn’t we have just seen her in “God’s Heart” and rejoiced that a genius had arrived? There are not so many geniuses. But the presence of a genius here and there might help to build a recognizable brand of theatre that signaled the presence – or at the very least the intention – of excellence inside. Stars do not signal excellence. God knows what they signal. And there are more of them than there are genius actors.  Stars are a dime a dozen. Or a hundred and twenty million a dozen. But a genius here and there might allow some adventurous leader to attract and build a company of great actors who will in turn draw in the public because they came to see the genius and they will come back because they had an experience comparable to the one I had when I was a kid and sat there enthralled  during “The Subject Was Roses” while Martin Sheen just listened to Irene Dailey as she stunningly sailed through her three page monologue in Act II but, oh, my lord, the way Martin Sheen listened.

It’s the experience that we want. We don’t need over-priced beauties who don’t age in order to have an experience. And I am talking about the kind of experience that we can only have at live theatre. Are you sick of hearing that yet? I will never be sick of saying it. It’s like saying there is no substitute for sex with love. Is there? Are we sick of sex yet? There are no signs. The experience of seeing a great actor walking onto a stage who wants something from another great actor who is already on that stage and the first great actor either gets what he came for or he doesn’t. What’s more thrilling that that? Maybe sex with love. It goes without saying that for people who go to sports events, the experience is primary. It may be a good game or a less than good game but it is still a game. And maybe LeBron played well and maybe he didn’t. The experience was still the point. Same with church. For those who go. Maybe it was a good sermon, maybe it was a lousy sermon. We still feel richer for having gone. If we went. And it should be the same with the theatre. But it is not. Not anymore. No, there has to be somebody famous to look at. Or sets to die for. Or celebrity nudity. Or a gimmick. You gotta have it. Like a stripper. (Thank you, Mr. Sondheim, for the simile.) Those of us who work in the theatre have become like tired old strippers, looking for a top banana to attract an audience willing to come in and take a gander at what’s left of our wares. The theatre all by itself has become…. well, not enough somehow. That is nonsense, of course, but it has become the case. It is now infuriatingly the case. And the reason, I would propose, is because that moment, that revelation which happens somewhere during the second half of the performance, when one human being reaches out to another in charity or with dark intent and is triumphant or is crushed, that moment is missing in action. Instead, we have stars. We lose. Stars used to be givers of profound feelings. We have been bullied into thinking they are people who look good naked.

Elsewhere in these pages, Frank Wood talks about this loss in a very moving way. There are several aha moments in our talk with Frank. I urge you to read it. He quite elegantly  puts his finger on the problem. I’m just adding my two cents. Frankly,  I would be surprised if we didn’t all share this concern that something is missing and it may be as simple and as complicated as moment to moment truth leading to a catharsis between actors on stage. Is that even wanted anymore? Well, who’s going to say ‘no’? But really? How deeply? How often? Is there any pride left in the fact that humanity can be revealed to itself in the theatre more profoundly than in any other art form? Or is the theatre just a place where a lot of freaks and geeks and out of work movie people hang out and, when they win awards, thank their partners?