Word: awkwardnesses
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Dates: during 1960-1969
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...predecessors are Treason, the drama of Benedict Arnold, and the non-historical Pageant of the Awkward Shadows, by Thomas Babe...
Miss Feltenstein is powerful in the dramatic scenes as the indomitable mother-figure part of the eternal feminine. But it is her voice that commands. Her motions are stiff and awkward in key scenes. Nightingale who outfits a comic chorus with amazing props and movements (they make marvelous animals going into the Ark), seems to have directed disembodied voices in the serious scenes. Even Beck, the company's most polished performer, often appears unsure of what to do with his hands at dramatic moments. The power of the scenes, especially the ends of the three acts, is undercut...
...only two good actors in the film (aside from Sellers) are John Mills and Ralph Richardson as the brothers but they are given little enough to do. Most of the action is centered around miscast, awkward, misty-eyed Michael Caine whose guardian is one of the brothers (you may have liked him in The Ipcress File but wait till you see him now) and his courtship with an orphan whose guardian is the other surviving brother. In an eminently forgettable role, she is a caricature of supposed Victorian modesty (her cousin's hobby of collecting eggs is deemed "obscene...
...After an awkward silence, he clinched it. "The only thing I can think of," he said, "is ice cream...
...play is one of total futility of existence. And this Mayer has captured economically by using a revolving set (designed by Clayton Koelb) pushed by Woyzeck and other characters in changing from scene to scene. At worst, the unpolished mechanics of the revolve made for some visually awkward scene transitions in the first act. But most of the time, especially when Woyzeck did the pushing, the slow turning of the set neatly captured the hopelessness of Woyzeck's life...