My Qualms With The WSS Revival - Page 3

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Posted: 10/9/09 at 12:21am

It seems that I am not the only one who feels teh changes made for the film version were generally improvements. But as long as Laurents is alive there is no chance of any of them being incorporated into stage productions. He has famously bad-mouthed the movie whenever he has had the chance. Was he upset he wasn't asked to write the screenplay? In a way he did, because 85% of what is said on screen is taken from the stage script.

Rentboy's comment that the script is short on character development is very accurate. The concept was to do most of that through song and dance, but when you compare the elements it makes the spoken dialogue seem rushed and shallow. It's really up to the actors working with the director to put the subtext in, and in this case the director is a 90 year old curmudgeon who seems intent on undermining the show's strengths.

Makes me wish even more that all of you could get up to see teh Stratford production before it ends.