GYPSY on PBS — Page 3

henrikegerman said: "While it might understandably impress many as the worst Gypsy possible on video, it impressed a great many, including myself, as the definitive Gypsy in the theatre.

They are very different media with very different demands.



"

henrik, I watched Angela play the part in an intimate, 1,200 seat house one day and in a 3,000 seat barn the next day. She never missed a beat, never was too big or too small (even while the rest of the cast fell over each other coping with the larger stage). She would have known how to handle the video. Just saying.

Saying it's unfair to critique a performance because we didn't see it live in the theater is ridiculous. It's put out there for us to see, therefore it will be critiqued.

Anyway, she may have been good in the theater, but on television, as Arthur would have said, "She stinks."

Updated On: 11/14/16 at 11:21 PM

Oh, lord, he would have been blistering.

Whatever you might say about Arthur's use of melodramatic climaxes (the catfight in The Turning Point, the rape in West Side) he prided himself on the subtlety and psychological nuance. He would talk about "earning the audience's reaction" and the danger of resorting to "unearned emotion." Also, liked twists and reveals and things that were "not as they seem at first."

There is no twist in Imelda's Rose, no turning point, no reveal, she is exactly the same at the end as she is at the beginning, and it is all unearned emotion.

The whole idea of Rose being a maniac when she enters Uncle Jocko's is something he would have dismissed as a "directorial notion."

He would have fired the director, taken over himself, and toned down Imelda's performance.

But tears and blood would have been shed in the process.

Updated On: 11/15/16 at 12:06 AM

I was worried Staunton was going to come off the stage and start beating up audience members.

I gotta say, the exaggerated hand gestures I mentioned could easily belong in a Mrs. Lovett performance, even on film. In fact, Helena Bonham Carter's Lovett was missing a bit of that.

I didn't think there was anything so wrong with Staunton's performance that a quick recalibration for video rather than stage wouldn't have fixed -- she was so clearly playing for the folks in the balcony rather than the camera that had zoomed into a tighter than tight closeup that she seemed to be bizarrely overplaying so much of it. There's no denying the brilliance of her Everything's Coming Up Roses.

I'd have forgiven it a lot more if they'd not found found it necessary to remove 99.999% of the humor from the show, making it into some full-on Greek Tragedy with a brass section, and frankly a rather too lackluster brass section. Those cadaverous strippers looked like extras from the Walking Dead, rather than the magnificent Mazeppa, Electra and Tessie Tura.

I'm starting to believe Gypsy is unfilmable even if shot from the stage. Something just doesn't translate well. Even on the TV movie, Bette Midler was playing to the rafters. Maybe Rose is just a character who is too large for the screen. I feel like Tyne Daly has been one of the few who could have probably brought her to the screen in a realistic way.

PalJoey said: "

Oh, lord, he would have been blistering.

Whatever you might say about Arthur's use of melodramatic climaxes (the catfight in The Turning Point, the rape in West Side) he prided himself on the subtlety and psychological nuance. He would talk about "earning the audience's reaction" and the danger of resorting to "unearned emotion." Also, liked twists and reveals and things that were "not as they seem at first."

There is no twist in Imelda's Rose, no turning point, no reveal, she is exactly the same at the end as she is at the beginning, and it is all unearned emotion...."

I completely agree with PJ and we know what Laurents would have thought because of the "silent bow" he added to the end of "Rose's Turn" for the original London production. I know Angela Lansbury is ancient history for many here, but her Rose really thought she was doing "it" for her kids. It was only during the silent bow after the seemingly endless applause for "Rose's Turn" that a slight change in Angela's facial expression showed us a Rose who was actually, if temporarily, deranged.

It remains one of the most horrifying moments I've seen in a theater.

But it barely registered from Staunton, who had been playing Medea from her opening entrance. (And, yes, I know I said I liked some parts of her performance. I did. But the whole was less than the sum of its parts.)

I found a version of this online, but I couldn't make it halfway through Act I. I was really looking forward to this too because I heard great things about Stauton's Rose beforehand. Bernadette Peters' Rose may be the most screen-friendly version of the "recent" Roses as she really wanted to bring out her humanity, even if some felt underwhelmed by her performance on stage. Lupone's Tony performance blew me away obviously but I think she would have been able to translate that appropriately on the screen as well given the right direction. With the right film direction, I'm sure Stauton's performance would have been much better as well.