The Year of Magical Thinking

[papeetepatrick]

Everybody will see this, but here's the link. I had known about the play, but not known it was going to be Vanessa Redgrave. Fantastic! I last saw her in 'Hecuba' which people at BT also did. A few months later I heard Didion read twice from the book. This should be the most extraordinary thing on Broadway in years.

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/05/26/theater/26didi.html?8dpc

Soon after the announcement was made last December that Joan Didion would be writing a one-woman play based on her autobiographical book, "The Year of Magical Thinking," Ms. Didion had a meeting with Scott Rudin, the Broadway producer who first proposed the idea, and David Hare, the British playwright who will be directing the production.

Edited March 31, 2007 by carbro

[dirac]

Thank you for the link, papeetepatrick. (I noodled with it to make it work a little faster, hope you don’t mind.) I agree with the quote from David Hare below, Redgrave is indeed just right for this.

But the play calls for an actress who can convincingly deliver Ms. Didion's words, not a mimic.

"She is the most emotionally expressive actor about a certain kind of extreme feeling," Mr. Hare said of Ms. Redgrave in a phone interview from London. "And one of Joan's extraordinary qualities is this glacially perfect prose which contains fantastic feeling underneath a formal surface."

[dirac]

Redgrave and Didion were interviewed recently on National Public Radio.

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=7238970

Redgrave calls herself "the interpreter, the communicator, the storyteller" of Didion's writing. "And I'm really in effect saying, 'This is what I know.' And I'm a shadow because I'm giving voice to what Joan knows or discovered."

I think this stands a good chance of being better than the book, with what Redgrave can bring to it.

[Ray]

Ben Brantley reveiws Joan Didion's Year of Magical Thinking, a one-woman show starring Vanessa Redgrave, in the NY Times today (3/30):

http://theater2.nytimes.com/2007/03/30/the...ews/30magi.html

I thought it was a great example of a very thoughtful and generous negative review--the likes of which we rarely see in the dance world, alas.

[papeetepatrick]

I thought it was a well done, thoughtful review too. I've read some others and actually like it that the reviews are mixed, it seems appropriate. The collaboration is as perfect as possible, but surely imperfect too. I'm a fan of Didion and Redgrave, but I'm no longer interested to see this.

Here are some other links:

http://news.google.com/news?hl=en&ned=us&q...tnG=Search+News

You can look at the photos of the pre-opening party, the celebs at the theater coming in, and at this one at Broadway World, the second one of Didion is disturbing, as she smiles--possibly tells you more about the reality of what it all means than even Ms. Redgrave could have done. Didion went to the party, but Redgrave wanted to stay focussed before performing. Quite an event and probably one-of-a-kind.

By the way, someone could combine Ray's thread with my original one about the show when it was first announced.

No matter how understated Redgrave in particular has tried to keep this, I'm not convinced this doesn't have something I don't quite like about it (at least the opening, which comes across as too garish and fashionable, perhaps), but then I thought the book, Didion's most popular to date, was actually her weakest work (most think it's her most powerful): She could no longer be cold as ice even if she was a 'cool customer', and she's best when she's been glacial or even superciliously unfair, I've often thought.

[carbro]

By the way, someone could combine Ray's thread with my original one about the show when it was first announced.

I just did. Thanks for the good suggestion!

[papeetepatrick]

http://www.newyorker.com/arts/critics/thea...th_theatre_lahr

This is the most interesting review I've read, and its conclusion is undoubtedly viable, if not totally so. It reminded me of the old Arlene Croce/Bill T. Jones controversy that we've discussed, to some degree. But I can see why Lahr might say that the play extends the magical thinking, because it is hard to think after too much exposure that this is still also (at least) about everyone's grief, about the very nature of all grief, and not, perhaps a bit morbidly, about continuing to talk about this particular grief--of course, this kind of pitfall was bound to happen, which is in itself sad, but still I think his final point convinces me of this: Even though there is a tastefully modest tone to the proceedings, there are too many proceedings for it to not seem 'too much'.

[dirac]

But I can see why Lahr might say that the play extends the magical thinking, because it is hard to think after too much exposure that this is still also (at least) about everyone's grief, about the very nature of all grief, and not, perhaps a bit morbidly, about continuing to talk about this particular grief--of course, this kind of pitfall was bound to happen, which is in itself sad, but still I think his final point convinces me of this: Even though there is a tastefully modest tone to the proceedings, there are too many proceedings for it to not seem 'too much'.

It sounds from the reviews in general as if a) the personal styles of Didion and Redgrave are not a great combination, as probably might have been anticipated, and b) the material wasn’t dramatized sufficiently. (As to whether Didion is properly ‘letting go’ or not, it’s certainly not for anyone to say, and Lahr might not have said that if the production had come off better.)

[papeetepatrick]

(As to whether Didion is properly ‘letting go’ or not, it’s certainly not for anyone to say, and Lahr might not have said that if the production had come off better.)

I know what you mean, but I also think it may not be a matter of 'letting go properly' so much as 'whether she is letting go as she says she is, by looking at other things that don't have to do with her husband and daughter.' Of course, even 'not letting go' is legitimate--and many I've known have never recovered from a spouse's death, and followed soon with their own death, much less a child in the same period. I follow her pretty closely, and I think if her own health holds up despite being the frailest person I've nearly ever seen (and much more so at a reading in 2005 than one I heard in 2001) she will be able to do some other kinds of work again, and even during the period of 'Magical Thinking's gestation, she did write a major article for NYReview on Cheney. I do recall in her immediately previous work 'Where I Was From', which I'd think Californians would all be interested in (and the Lakewood section is fiercely brilliant), she was reflecting on the pioneers, among whom were her ancestors, and mentioned that grief was not something anyone making their way through the dangers of the Old West could afford to do. So that a play like this could easily appear to be a luxurious kind of grieving process, and of course it is that, but that's not inappropriate for a talent such as hers--and, in any case, the idea for the play was not hers; it took her awhile to come around to it. All great artists have some personal trait that is perhaps not quite as admirable as some of the others, and people unrealistically expect them to be perfect. With Didion, the accusation of snobbism has always been there, and it's easy enough to see it--it's then according to whether you think it's minor in comparison to what else she offers (I obviously do, even though I just don't happen to be interested in this play, other than knowing about it.)