STAGE STRUCK

New Zealand Listener, Volume 41, Issue 1049, 2 October 1959, Page 18

STAGE STRUCK

(RKO-Radio) G Cert. HAD one 6r two personal (and admittedly illogical) reasons for picking on Stage Struck as the film of the week. I wanted to hear, as well as see, Joan Greenwood-an indulgence that I rarely enjoy these days. I was interested to see Fonda, back East again, and I was plain curious about little Miss Strasberg, the unMethodical daughter of Lee Strasberg, director of the Actor’s Studio. However. conscientiously

studying the small print as well as the large in the display panels outside the theatre, I was comforted by the thought that, the path of duty and the gentle slope of self-indulgence met at the box-office. After Twelve Angry Men, anything

directed by Sidney Lumet could count on my financial support, particularly if it promised the conjunction of Lumet and Fonda. | As it happened, it wasn’t the LumetFonda association that held my attention or kept things rolling. Henry was his usual competent, quiet and persuasive self-almost too much the usual to be exciting. And of course, as you might expect from the title, Stage Struck is some distance from the constricted TV-style format, the introversion, and the character-probing of Twelve Angry Men. And though I greatly enjoyed Miss Greenwood’s Tallulah-style portrayal of a witty but bitchy and calculating leading lady, it was another voice altogether that I fell for. Nothing, in fact,.turned out quite. as I expected it to, but what surprised me most of all was the skill with which Lumet took an outworn theme-one of the corniest and most stereotyped in movie literature-and made it sparkle with novelty and a captivating lyricism. Made me accept it too, without reservations. In part this was accomplished by a shrewd and skilful attention to atmosphere and locale. This (and I quote here from the press-sheet) is the first major colour feature photographed entirely in New York. However romantic the story may sound in Cold print, Lumet has made sure that the settings are accurate enough. These neon constellations woven through the creditsequence are the bright lights of Times Square and 45th, this theatre set is in fact a theatre stage and auditorium, Sardi’s restaurant is not a mock-up, but the real thing. And if the camera-crews, led by Franz Planer and Maurice Hartzband, have given us, by one trick or another, something which is a little more than documentary realism it is appropriate in a story of the theatre, which adds its own dimension to life. They have achieved some beautiful effects too. One longshot-two lovers wandering homewards down a deserted street as the dawn warms the topmost towers of the skyscrapers-reminded me most vividly of the prologue to The Cranes are Flying, and lost nothing in the comparison. But all these attributes, and the engaging performance of La Greenwood, Fonda, old hand Herbert Marshall and

a pleasant new recruit from Broadway, Christopher Plummer, served-for me -only as foils and background for the entrancing Susan Strasberg. She has only been twice in films before (last time as the young sister in Picnic) but unless she deserts Hollywood for the stage we'll see much more of her. Her part was by no means an easy one, and at one point-a sequence requiring unflawed diction and_ the meticulous maintenance of mood and atmosphere-I found myself ludicrously concerned that some false note might impair the poignancy of the scene. But nothing broke the bubble-iridescence of the moment; actress and director were in complete accord. I find it difficult to understand, therefore, why the film failed to run a week in Wellington. The competition of domestic opera and visiting orchestra may have diverted some discerning filmgoers, but I can’t help feeling sorry for the others who missed it.