Imagine, 50 years from today, someone writing a play about Streisand, in her seventies, going forward with a project to film and star in Gypsy, with lots of other people advising her that this is a wrong-headed move. Janet McTeer is radiant, making one mindful of mid-career Helen Mirren.
Having finally seen this, I don’t agree. The difference is that there are more and better roles – if not many - being written for Streisand in this day and age. And Sarah is trying to figure out how to do her work despite the confines and limitations of the world she lives in, in which very few rolls of consequence or complexity are being written for women.
The engine of the play is a bit buried now, but it was the fourth preview that I saw. Sarah‘s determination to break through the glass ceiling is palpable and affecting and I found the scene where she confronts Rostand particularly heartbreaking. The audience clapped multiple times in agreeement w her, particular about crappy roles being beneath her and all other women. I don’t remember the line but it hit my gut.
