Word: kean
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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September also marks the beginning of the TV year for PBS and "Masterpiece Theater." In this two-part series, the season's opener, they share the pleasure of revealing one of France's best-kept secrets: Jean-Paul Sartre is a very funny man. Kean, which he wrote for the Paris stage 25 years ago, is the proof. Loosely based on the life of Britain's great 19th century actor, Edmund Kean, it can only be described as an existential farce, a humorous assault on both head and heart...
...Kean was the first superstar, an Olivier onstage and an Errol Flynn off, a rake, a wastrel and yet an actor, as Critic William Hazlitt said, who had "a gleam of genius." If he were at the end of his career today, he would be writing his memoirs in Malibu and growing rich off Polaroid commercials. In Sartre's play, however, he is dodging creditors, juggling mistresses and in his spare moments asking himself that old existential question: Who am I? Sartre's answer, given with stylish wit, is that Kean is like all of life...
...usually disappointing, and Anthony Hopkins, who has been asked to portray one of the greatest, is, regrettably, no exception. He has the talent, technique and energy for the part; but he lacks the presence and personality. Robert Stephens, who is the Prince of Wales - a player prince to Kean's prince of players - has both, and he all but steals the show. It is a pity that the two roles were not reversed...
...there is no denying the opening scene's strong visual impact. Indeed the production generally serves the eye a good deal better than it serves the ear. The play contains a lot of magic and spectacle, handled most ingeniously (and without the 140-man stage crew that Charles Kean needed in 1857). When Miranda is put to sleep, she slumbers levitated a couple of feet above ground. The instantaneous appearance and disappearance of the banquet (borrowed from Book II of Vergil's Aeneid) is truly miraculous, as are the periodic flashes of St. Elmo's fire all over the place...
Katherine Kean as Cunegonde, though somewhat overshadowed by the prevailing lunacy, gives a coy and engaging performance. Kean has a stunning voice which she displays in a solo called "Glitter and Be Gay." Her operatic fireworks brought a two-minute ovation. Kean's acting is almost as good as her voice, though she tends to overdo the fluffy-headed childishness of the gold-digging Cunegonde...