Word: comics
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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...Front is a schizophrenic film. The script attempts to treat seriously a tragic and chilling period of American history when the ideal of personal freedom was subordinated to the fear of a "Communist menace." But the film cannot resist a comic tendency that cheapens and detracts from its political message. Complicating the problems embedded in the script are two extremely talented comedians who find themselves cast in straight dramatic roles which cannot suppress their seemingly irrepressible knack for "getting a laugh." Because it's impossible to watch either Woody Allen or Zero Mostel without expecting a humorous line sooner...
What distinguishes all these programs is a frank and total lack of pretense. They all seem to proceed from the belief that a television series should not aspire to any greater intellectual or emotional depth than the comic books that seem to have inspired them. The dialogue is apparently borrowed from old Batman balloons. Brightly lit and crudely shot, the visual style indeed reminds one of comic art at its least sophisticated level...
...grave. The Boston Repertory Theatre features a contemporary version of The Misanthrope; the production inspires antipathy not towards mankind in general but towards one in particular; the director. Scapino! at the Loeb fares much better; George Hamlin's skilled direction turns an uneven collection of actors into a smooth comic troupe...
...only the barest skeleton from the Moliere play. A standard comedy plot (a pair of lovers, hidden identities, knowing rogues, fodish parents) is used as a jumping-off point for an evening of slapstick and mime. Scapino is a showcase rather than a play; its success depends on the comic talents of the actors in a show which has no pretensions to dramatic integrity. The script demands a veritable catalogue of comedy skills, ranging from stand-up routines to sexual sightgags to circus acrobatics...
...book. After all the documentary evidence was catalogued, Dash was able to press a button and have a print-out of, for example, all testimony about the March 23, 1973, meeting between Dean and Nixon. Or he could have all the evidence relating to transactions between McCord and the comic ex-New York cop, Tony Ulasewicz. Access to this kind of this information must have been invaluable in sorting out the masses of documents the committee collected and was used by the special prosecutor's office and the subsequent House impeachment inquiry. Had the Senate committee been able...