Word: classically
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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What a botch The Big Sleep is! First, it is an entirely unnecessary movie. Howard Hawks adapted Raymond Chandler's classic detective story 30-odd years ago and he did it right: Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall played the leading roles and Chandler's essential mood, at once cynical, gloomy and absurdist, remained intact. As that film is available on TV and in memory's theater, there is no reason to try to duplicate it. There is absolutely no reason to rip Chandler's immortal gumshoe, Philip Marlowe, from his natural milieu, Los Angeles...
...earlier works Winner sometimes demonstrated a certain vulgar energy, but even that has congealed as he respectfully confronts this "classic," and he seems to have communicated only that to his actors. As Marlowe, Robert Mitchum seems merely weary. Sarah Miles and Candy Clark, as the rich, spoiled and sexy sisters who inspire so much greed in others, as well as James Stewart, Oliver Reed, Richard Boone, John Mills, Joan Collins and Edward Fox, as assorted villains, victims and cops, all seem to be doing turns in a variety show rather than acting in an intelligently integrated drama. The result...
...teammate, Chris J. Downey '81, thus captured the first Dunster House Lloyd Walker Classic Eight-Ball Championship, defeating Dunster House residents Tony B. Bator '79 and Tod Tanaka...
...PROBLEM of a ballet such as Sleeping Beauty is not to make the audience believe the fantasy, but to make us not mind that we don't believe it. The dancing doesn't have to carry it alone--after all, this pull-out-all-the-stops Imperial Russian classic, complete with Tchaikovsky score and choreography by the legendary Marius Petipa, is nothing if not an occasion for bravura theatrical spectacle. The dance comes like expensive chocolates wrapped in gold foil: we're supposed to enjoy the package almost as much as the contents...
Still, the performance remained surprisingly transparent. It showed the Company's individuality only in their weaknesses: the choreographic banality, the ragged ensemble work, the inconsistent quality of the soloists. Beyond that, this charming and classically faithful Sleeping Beauty could have been anyone's Sleeping Beauty. The only positive statement it made about the Boston company was that the performers can bring a timeless classic off well, leaving open the question of whether New England's most important ballet ensemble has yet found an identity...