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re: A DELICATE BALANCE last night

Posted by: AlanScott 12:05 am EST 11/14/14
In reply to: re: A DELICATE BALANCE last night - RLand 01:00 pm EST 11/13/14
Very interesting to hear from someone else who saw the original production.

In the Gussow bio of Albee, it's mentioned that at the first public performance, Jessica Tandy was surprised by all the laughter. According to Albee, at the first preview Tandy (this is now direct quotation from Albee) "came offstage quivering because the audience was laughing, and she had forgotten that the play was funny.

I do think it should be funny, although since I didn't see the original production I obviously can't say whether the laughter when you saw it was the kind of laughter you'd want.

I have kind of mixed feelings about the movie. I wish it were funnier. It feels like they tried to play against the comedy.

Schneider was widely disliked by actors, especially (or so it seems, based on what I've read) by women (although Bert Lahr also seems not to have had an easy time with him). If the account in the Gussow book can be trusted, it seems that at least three of the four women in the cast of A Delicate Balance found him unnecessarily nasty. He seems to have been particularly unpleasant to Carmen Mathews, but he also brought Tandy to tears. Marian Seldes does not have good things to say about him in the book, and I don't recall hearing or reading her ever speaking negatively about anyone else.


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