miracle worker with hilary swank

[Yankeefan007]

Posted: 12/19/04 at 1:01pm

why didnt this one come to broadway?

[iluvtheatertrash]

Posted: 12/19/04 at 3:24pm

They had a theater, a marquee and everything but I believe funding fell through. Not positive.

[MargoChanning]

Posted: 12/19/04 at 4:23pm

Swank, by all accounts, was absolutely terrible. At least one report I heard used the word "embarassment." Once the producers saw her performance and realized it was unsalvagable (and that it was too late to bring in another "name" actress), they shut the whole production down out of town and cut their losses.

[maybethistime]

Posted: 12/19/04 at 4:27pm

im not a fan of swank, nor am i surprised. embarassment is right.

[BobbyBubby]

Posted: 12/19/04 at 4:29pm

MargoChanning is right. I believe there was a pre-Broadway tryout, and Swank was awful. Swank is a very touch-and-go performer (I can only speak for her film work). With good direction she can be fine to superior, but she often falls apart when under bad guidance. Perhaps that was the reason she fell apart in Miracle Worker. She also seemed all wrong for the part. The casting of Hollywood actresses with little stage experience isn't something I have enjoyed much. The prodcuers of Miracle Worker were lucky they got an out of town view of Hilary Swank's performance, rather than throwing her to the wolves of New York.

[MusicMan]

Posted: 12/19/04 at 4:47pm

Swank is amazing in MILLION DOLLAR BABY, easily her best work since BOYS DON'T CRY. The verisimilitude of her boxing scenes is rather astonishing and utterly believable.
AND it's a wonderful movie as well, drawing you slowly into the story and taking you places you'd never thought you'd go!

[BobbyBubby]

Posted: 12/19/04 at 4:55pm

Maybe Swank is only good when playing "butch" characters. hehe

[MusicMan]

Posted: 12/19/04 at 4:57pm

She is not "butch" in this movie at all and her chemistry with Eastwood is palpable onscreen.

[Dollypop]

Posted: 12/19/04 at 9:11pm

There's a vast difference between being "amazing" on screen and giving a good performance on stage.

Case in point: Jessica Lange in STREETCAR. I saw the production early in its previews and Lange was woefully inadequate. She couldn't project her voice or personality beyond the footlight. Alec Baldwin, on the other hand, as exceptionally good as Stanley. When a TV movie was made with the two of them, Lange gave a good (if annoying) performance. Talking to Alec Baldwin several years later, he told me that Lange grew in the role with every performance and was very good by the time the limited run ended.

What I'm saying here is that movie stars aren't always effective when they have to play eight performances a week in front of live audiences.

Another point: THE MIRACLE WORKER probably doesn't play well these days. The material itself might come off as corny by today's standards.

[BobbyBubby]

Posted: 12/19/04 at 10:58pm

Um, HIlary Swank is pretty butch-point blank. And I imagine, playing a boxer-she is even butcher. But true, she is apparently amazing in her new movie. Some actors can only hold their performance until the director says cut-it is another thing to create and ark night after night...

[Auggie27]

Posted: 12/20/04 at 9:42am

Interesting, all of this. I had tix for the Swank MIRACLE, and I heard from friends in the biz that the show closed out of town because it was badly directed (check out the reviews -- the director was labled the culprit)AND, more far critically, there was simply no advance. I remember buying tix at the box office, and the run was wide open. You could buy seats all over the house for any performance. As for Swank being "too butch" -- Annie Sullivan wasn't exactly Jessica Simpson. Watch the Bancroft performance.

What's thrilling about MILLION DOLLAR BABY is the way it breaks the curse on this recent batch of young Oscar winners (Swank, Berry, and Theron). They seem to disappear into blandness once they win. Look at Theron's work this past year--no impact. And Hallie is in dire need of new readers--a career overall. Hillary has bounced back after a lot of stuff that did her no favors (THE CORE). Just getting another nomination will move her forward again. She may not win for BABY (Staunton?, but coming only a few years after the first win at least moves her into the Sally Field position.

[Dollypop]

Posted: 12/20/04 at 9:44am

Am I the only person who thinks Bancroft over-acts in every role she plays?

[Rathnait62]

Posted: 12/20/04 at 9:53am

I actually loved Lange in STREETCAR - it was Baldwin who seriously disappointed me with his vocal affectations and bad acting. I can't remember where in the run I saw it, but I do remember having heard that Lange was difficult to hear, and I did not have that problem with her at all. I found her to be just wonderful.

[Auggie27]

Posted: 12/20/04 at 10:02am

Not to turn the Swank thread into a Lange one ... but I have to agree with Rath on Lange. I loved her Blanche, and wanted desperately to see her Mary Tyrone in the London LONG DAYS JOURNEY, which people said was perfection (more the age for the role than Redgrave, too). Yes, she had technique issues, finding the proper size and projection. But by all accounts, she mastered that. Her characterization was extraordinary however, full of nuance and dimension. Check out the TV filmed version -- where Baldwin, effective as he was in parts, simply doesn't match her. (But I'm a Baldwin fan, Dolly, so don't yell at me. I had perhaps too high hope for his Stanley. Remember how great he was in LOOT with Charles Keating? He was extraordinary.)

[OrdinaryJukebox1]

Posted: 12/20/04 at 10:22am

I didn't get to see Hilary Swank in "The Miracle Worker." However, watch "Boys Don't Cry," "The Affair of the Necklace," and "Iron Jawed Angels" and tell me she's not a wonderful actor. The latter aren't the best films, but she gives wonderful performances. I haven't had a chance to see "Million Dollar Baby," but she's getting nominated left and right, and just won a Boston Film Critics award, along with two nominations at the Golden Globes.

-Vincent

[CaTheatreGirl]

Posted: 12/20/04 at 10:41am

Besides the problems with Hillary Swank, I also recall reading that the little girl playing Helen Keller was not doing a very good job either. She kept looking around which was not typical of someone who is blind. Again, watch Patty Duke in the original instead.

[MusicMan]

Posted: 12/20/04 at 11:58am

THE MIRACLE WORKER "corny?" It's only one of the most moving and life-affirming plays ever written and a shattering theatrical experience. Anyone who would find the material "corny" is more blind, deaf and dumb than Helen Keller ever was.

[Dollypop]

Posted: 12/20/04 at 12:08pm

I teach STREETCAR in my Junior English classes and show the Baldwin/Lange video as a follow-up. (The Brando/Leigh version massacres the original text. The Baldwin/Lange version is much truer to Williams' original. Besides, my ghetto-rats refuse to watch anything that isn't in color!)

Upon repeated viewings, I find Lange to be everything Williams intended Blanche to be. However, she is irritating while she does so. Vivian Leigh also delivered the goods but wasn't the least bit irritating while she did so.

I think Baldwin was excellent as Stanley, both on-stage and in the film. This is coming from someone who has watched the video no less than 20 times int he past 10 years.

[SueleenGay]

Posted: 12/20/04 at 12:24pm

Besides, my ghetto-rats refuse to watch anything that isn't in color!

Wow, racism is such a Christian trait. So glad you are taking your ministry to the jungle and trying to save the souls of the heathen. God surely is saving a special place for you in heaven.

Updated On: 12/20/04 at 12:24 PM

[SueleenGay]

Posted: 12/20/04 at 12:27pm

And...hope you have a white xmas.

[Dollypop]

Posted: 12/20/04 at 1:35pm

Not racist...not at all.

My students are ghetto dwellers and have the "gangsta" mentality that is often found in the ghetto. They wear nothing but clothing with the designers logo emblazoned across them and are more interested in their bling-bling than anything else. In a class conversation pertaining to the boar that is a main character in George Orwell's ANIMAL FARM, one student mentioned Boar's Head cold cuts, stating that it was a name brand. Another student (female) remarked: "I thought only clothes were name-brands". Okay, that's the "ghetto rat" mentality I'm dealing with.

My students have no interest in anything outside their 'hood, and although they live a mere 20 minute subway ride from Manhattan, very few of them ever go there.

For these kids to respond to A STREETCAR NAMED DESIRE as well as they do, is impressive--even if it means I have to sit through three showings of the Baldwin/Lange video of it three times a year.

[OrdinaryJukebox1]

Posted: 12/20/04 at 2:35pm

Amen to that! There are just as many white "ghetto-rats" as there is black, hispanic, and everything in between. I didn't think it was racist at all! I work with children as well, much younger, so "A Streetcar Named Desire" isn't on our list this year...they're 5 and 6. hehe

-Vincent

[robbiej]

Posted: 12/20/04 at 2:43pm

I'm sorry, but the 'gangsta' lifestyle started in the black community...so even though there are white kids emulating such behavior, we have to recognize that it is 'black' behavior and so there is an element of racism to it.

I'm not casting stones. I'm guilty myself of it. But to just say that it's not racist is plain wrong.

[SuddenlyTrey]

Posted: 12/20/04 at 4:34pm

I saw the out of town mounting in Charlotte. Swank was absolutely dreadful. Never on stage was there an ounce of truth from her performance. Technically the show was very impressive for the Booth Theatre in NC. Even if they found a replacement for Swank, the show could have been better. Why revive a classic if you don't have a new brilliant concept? Jeffery Carlson who recent graduated from Julliard and was in The Goat..., Taboo and others was also in the show and did a worthy performance. In the talk back after she stated how hard it was to memorize the lines to the script since she is used to a days notice for film scenes. It was almost insulting. She is brilliant in film I'm not disregarding that fact, but her performance would have had Ben Brantley laughing out vile remarks in the review. The saved money not bringing it to BWAY.

[BWayBoy88]

Posted: 12/20/04 at 7:53pm

Sort of off topic, but does anyone else think Dakota Fanning(sp?) would make a really good Helen Keller?