terrshee's Diaryland Diary

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The Play was Not the Thing

I went to see Lady Windermere's Fan today. I started off well with a lovely lunch of eggs benedict at Bistro D'Oc. Is there anything more decadent that hollandaise sauce properly prepared? And pommes frittes done to perfection?

Then a nice book browse at Olsson's and the successful find of a new book about the condotierrie in 14th century Italy. Woo Hoo! Geeks gone wild!

Then on to the Lansburg and the play. I left at intermission. It wasn't bad. Certainly the staging was exquisite. But the air conditioning was blasting away (oh the irony, me who has none at home and have been suffering) and one of the patrons sitting near me smelled bad. Not like body odor bad, but stale old person bad, although it wasn't an elderly individual. All rather distracting. More important though, was that I couldn't feel very involved with what was going on. An obviously pregnant actress is playing Lady Windermere, and it rather destroys the illusion (which is weird considering that the character is supposed to have had a child six months before). And none of the other performances seemed the least sympathetic to me. Even the delights of Wilde's language couldn't quite overcome the distancing. Ah, well, I'll look forward to Othello with Avery Brooks in the fall.

I am reminded of seeing Vincent Price in his one man show on Oscar Wilde mumble years ago. Now there was a performance to capture the imagination. I don't suppose all actors with great voices are great actors, but Mr. Price had such wonderful intonation and inflection. He really could convey the irony and self-loathing of a man ruined by his own genious.

6:20 p.m. - 2005-07-17
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