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| Kathleen Widdoes, Raul Julia. |
The following precedes each entry
"In Lieu of Reviews"
Around 40 years ago, I began a major project that eventuated in the
publication of my multivolume series, The Encyclopedia of the New York
Stage, each volume covering a decade. For some reason now lost to the sands
of time, I chose to start with the 1970s. After writing all the entries through
1975 and producing a typed manuscript of 1,038 pages my publisher (Greenwood)
and I decided it would be best to commence with the 1920s. So the 1970-1975
material was put aside as I produced volumes for 1920-1930, 1930-1940, and
1940-1950. With those concluded, Greenwood decided it was all too expensive and
not sufficiently profitable, so the remaining volumes were cancelled, leaving
my 1970s entries in limbo.
To compensate, I used the research I’d done on the 1970s to write a
book for Greenwood called Ten Seasons: New York Theatre in the
Seventies, which described all aspects of that era’s theatre, onstage and
off. Many years later, in 2012, I began a postretirement “career” as a theatre
reviewer, which led to my creating this blog as an outlet for my reviews. Over
the past eight years or so I’ve posted nearly 1,600 reviews, a substantial
number having first appeared on other websites: Theater Pizzazz, The Broadway
Blog, and Theater Life.
Now, however, with the New York theatre in suspension, and my
reviewing completely halted, is probably the perfect time to post as many as
possible of the entries I prepared for the never-published 1970-1975 book. The
entries that follow are in alphabetical order. Each entry has a heading listing
the subject categories of the work described: the author (A), the director (D),
additional staging (ADD ST), when credited; the producer (P), the set designer
(S), the costume designer (C), the lighting designer (L), the source (SC), the
theatre (T), the dates of the run, and, in parentheses, the length of the run.
The original entries also contained the names of all the actors but I’ve omitted
those here.
In addition to the shows chronicled here, the New York professional theatre
produced hundreds of others, largely in the form of showcases receiving brief
runs of a dozen or less performances, most of them unreviewed. Their credits
and other significant data can be found in sources such as the annual series
called Theatre World and The Theater Yearbook: The Best Plays of . .
.
I will try to post at least one entry daily. When time allows, I’ll
provide more. The manuscript exists on fading, fragile paper and, because no
digital files exist, must be retyped. Hopefully, the tragic health situation
we’re all enduring will abate before I get too far into posting these entries
but, for the time being, devoted theatre lovers may find reading these
materials informative.
There
were two revivals of As You Like It between
1970 and 1975.
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| John Harkins, Bill McIntyre, Kelly Wood. |
(1) AS YOU LIKE IT [Dramatic Revival] A: William Shakespeare; D: Joseph
Papp; S: Santo Loquasto; C: Theoni V. Aldredge; L: Martin Aronstein; M: David
Shire; P: New York Shakespeare Festival; T: Delacorte Theatre (OB); 6/21/73-7/21/73
(28)
Director Joseph Papp placed his
revival of Shakespeare’s Arcadian romantic comedy, starring Raul Julia and
Kathleen Widdoes in the leads, in a 19th-century Ruritanian environment that
Walter Kerr deemed “roughly Napoleonic . . . frock coats, ample top hats,
Dickensian pea-jackets.” The concept, however, failed to gain universal
approval.
Clive Barnes found the idea “attractive,”
but Kerr felt it made no “particular point.” To Barnes, Santo Loquasto’s set,
which attempted to serve both for town and country scenes, was a “a remarkably
bosky and verdant” one that worked better for the Forest of Eden than the
scenes at court, “but the effect with its staircases and arbors is undeniably
agreeable and imaginative.” John Simon, though, was repulsed by the design and
felt it ran “achingly counter to the play’s manifest meaning.” He also
disagreed with those who lavished praise on Theoni V. Aldredge’s costumes, in
addition to calling them “tacky, uninspired and unperceptive,” having no
connection with the text.
Of the production itself, there were
some quite agreeable notices. Barnes thought the stress on the play’s soft and
pastoral aspect . . . entirely valid,” but could have done with swifter pacing
in the early scenes and more amusing clowns. Kerr liked many of the “isolated
sequences,” but thought “the show as a whole failed to coalesce properly.
Simon, who attacked everything about the revival, called the performances "garish," and said that Raul Julia’s Orlando comes
straight from a West Side Story Puerto
Rican street gang.” His even nastier barrage in the direction of Kathleen
Widdoes’s Rosalind, at variance with almost all the other critical evaluations,
accused her of “narcissism to the point of nymphomania.” But Barnes wrote, “Raul
Julia offers us an Orlando of such ineffable and lovable simplicity that even
the character’s foolishness becomes an engaging aspect of rustic virtue.” Of
Widdoes, he said she was “a particularly spirited, at times almost hoydenish,
Rosalind.”
Mixed opinions were offered of
Frederick Coffin’s Jacques, too. Simon calling him “as charmless as his name,”
but Edith Oliver enjoying his “droll, original” interpretation with its “boozy
air and the jaundiced melancholy of a bad hangover.” Kerr was highly intrigued
by Coffin’s reading of the “All the world’s a stage” speech as if it were an “almost
idiotically obvious . . . explanation of a puzzle the Duke has just propounded.”
Actors of note in the production
included Marybeth Hurt as Celia, Douglas Watson as Duke Senior, and Meat Loaf
as Amiens.
(2) D: Clifford Williams; DS: Ralph
Koltai; L: Robert Onobo; M: Marc Wilkinson; P: Hurok i/a/w Herman and Diane
Shumlin b/a/w the National Theatre of Great Britain; T: Mark Hellinger Theatre;
12/3/74-12/8/74 (8)
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| David Schofield, Gregory Floy, John Negtteton, Paul Hastings as Celia, Rosalind, Jacques, Orlando |
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| David Schofield, Gregory Floy, Nigel Hawthorne (as Touchstone). |
Clifford Williams’s concept, based
on ideas found in the “Shakespeare’s Bitter Arcadia” essay in Polish critic Jan
Kott’s controversial book, Shakespeare,
Our Contemporary, aimed to explore the sexual ambiguities of Shakespeare’s
comedy by having the female roles played by men. The result, at least in this
Broadway mounting, led most critics to consider it like a drag show with an
unambiguously homosexual aura. Much of this was due to what was seen as the
excessively campy portrayals of Rosalind by Gregory Floy, Celia by David
Schofield, and Phebe by Christopher Neame. There were also intimations in some
of the male roles of a gay orientation.
 |
| Geoffrey Burridge, Christopher Neame as Silvius and Phebe. |
Most of the critics were dissatisfied
with the concept. A few argued that a more authentic approach would have been
to use adolescent males, not adult ones.
The effect, John Simon wrote, turned out “militantly wronte-headed and
perverse.” Brendan Gill and John Beauforet did not believe the gay slant was
all that obvious, however. Gill said the plot became clearer through having the
girls played by men.
 |
| David Schofield, GregoryFloy, John Flint (as Charles), Paul Hastings. |
Overall, the show lacked strong
acting and seemed “dull” (Douglas Watt), “just acceptable” (Martin Gottfried), and
“merely a novelty” (Howard Kissell).
The 1968 unisex costumes and black
and white geometric plastic and aluminum settings of Ralph Koltai, which suggested
a “mod” Carnaby Street look, were attractive but clearly dated in 1974, while
the soft rock music of Marc Wilkinson, played by a strolling onstage combo, was
commendable.
Prior to this revival, New York in
the 20th century had seen 13 others, the most successful being in 1950 when
Katharine Hepburn played Rosalind at the Cort Theatre in a staging that ran 144
performances.
Previous entries:
Abelard and
Heloise
Absurd Person
Singular
AC/DC
“Acrobats”
and “Line”
The Advertisement/
All My Sons
All Over
All Over Town
All the Girls Came
Out to Play
Alpha Beta
L’Amante Anglais
Ambassador
American Gothics
Amphitryon
And Miss Reardon
Drinks a Little
And They Put
Handcuffs on the Flowers
And Whose Little
Boy Are You?
Anna K.
Anne of Green
Gables
Antigone
Antiques
Any Resemblance to Persons Living or Dead
Applause
Ari