SITE GUIDE
SEARCH
REVIEWS
REVIEW ARCHIVES
ADVERTISING AT CURTAINUP
FEATURES
NEWS
Etcetera and
Short Term Listings
LISTINGS
Broadway
Off-Broadway
NYC Restaurants
BOOKS and CDs
OTHER PLACES
Berkshires
London
California
New Jersey
Philadelphia
Elsewhere
QUOTES
TKTS
PLAYWRIGHTS' ALBUMS
LETTERS TO EDITOR
FILM
LINKS
MISCELLANEOUS
Free Updates
Masthead
A CurtainUp Los Angeles Review
A Word or Two
By Jon Magaril
|
"Words were to be my masters and I their humble slave. Well, not so humble perhaps." .—Christopher Plummer
|
Christopher Plummer(Photo: David Hou)
|
The Oscar, Tony, and Emmy winner may be North America's best purveyor of old barnstorming grandiloquence, but he soft-pedals it here with sly self-mockery. As a result, he offers up his life story as a divertissement fit for a literary salon.
The eighty-four year-old may have considered naming the piece "Words, Words, Words." After all, it's a salute to the key role literature has played during every phase of his life. And quoting Hamlet would make sense, since the renowned actor describes making his first professional splash as the melancholy Dane. He leads instead with a mock modesty that smartly scales back our expectations. After all, A Word or Two rarely has an overt emotion or two.
Plummer offers himself up as a humble vassal to the likes of Lewis Carroll, Charles Dickens, and Rudyard Kipling who gave comfort during his painful boyhood, buffeted by his parents' divorce. Soon, Wilde and others became the vessels by which he transformed himself into a jaded gentleman about as "shy as a hand grenade."
His voice takes on force and resonance while delivering Shakespeare, Shaw and American Nobel Laureate Archibald MacLeish. The writers proffered him the platform to rise into the pantheon of revered contemporary actors and he repays the favor here by doing his level best not to steal focus. Plummer may get plummy when quoting cleverness. He lets the more profound work speak for itself.
Des McAnuff's lovely production matches Plummer's performance. Robert Brill's artful set design places a plume of books up center, like a winding stairway to heady paradise. A lecturn, a wood frame evoking a church's stained glass window, even a director's chair all lend an ethereal grace in their natural hues and elegant lines under Michael Walton's warm lighting.
Sean Nieuwenuis's text-based video design makes literal the ultimate truth of Plummer's sense of self. Here stands that increasingly endangered creature: a man of letters. This autobiography isn't particularly soul-stirring, but for seventy-five minutes one gets to breathe rarified air. It's a privilege to be in his presence.
|
A Word or Two Written, arranged, and performed by Christopher Plummer Directed by Des McAnuff Set Designer: Robert Brill Lighting Designer: Michael Walton Composer: Michael Roth Sound Designer: Peter McBoyle Running time: Seventy-five minutes without an intermission Runs through February 9 at Ahmanson Theatre at the Music Center, 135 N. Grand Ave, Los Angeles 90012 213.628.2772 www.centertheatregroup.org Reviewed by Jon Magaril |
|
REVIEW FEEDBACK Highlight one of the responses below and click "copy" or"CTRL+C"
Paste the highlighted text into the subject line (CTRL+ V): Feel free to add detailed comments in the body of the email. . .also the names and emails of any friends to whom you'd like us to forward a copy of this review. For a feed to reviews and features as they are posted add http://curtainupnewlinks.blogspot.com to your reader Curtainup at Facebook . . . Curtainup at Twitter Subscribe to our FREE email updates: E-mail: esommer@curtainup.comesommer@curtainup.com put SUBSCRIBE CURTAINUP EMAIL UPDATE in the subject line and your full name and email address in the body of the message. If you can spare a minute, tell us how you came to CurtainUp and from what part of the country. |
|
Anything Goes Cast Recording
Book of Mormon -CD