Word: ophelias
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: during 1950-1959
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...chiller, when Fernand Ravinel's wife refuses to dissolve their unhappy marriage through divorce, his doctor-mistress Monique suggests dissolving it through murder. As the efficient Monique drowns the wife in a bathtub and then makes her appear to drown in a stream-a Lady Macbeth superintending an Ophelia's fale -a scared Fernand quivers like jelly and wobbles like a tenpin. And then, when he can hardly stay on his feet, he suddenly discovers that...
...with an immensely rich, exceedingly harassed, many-times-married heiress. All about her Palm Beach house are nest-featherers and heiress-fleecers: aunts and doctors and private secretaries, former and future husbands. The heiress herself is usually up and about by midafternoon, a sort of party-girl Ophelia given to the champagne shakes. Then a visiting poet takes her for a day in the sunshine and bids her go away and find herself...
Among the other principals, the most engaging are Edith Iselin, as Ophelia, and Richard Smithies, as Polonius. Miss Iselin plays Ophelia with a youthful lightness that is often quite charming in its novelty. If we don't usually think of Ophelia as a young girl, Miss Iselin shows that she can be. As for Smithies, he gives what is probably his best performance to date. His Polonius is restrained but generally pleasant. Due in large part to their work and that of Marc Brugnoni, in the role of the first grave-digger, the comicscenes are perhaps the most effective part...
...hand pressed flat and white against the black skirt, the other holding the script before her, she read the Queen's description of Ophelia's drowning in a soft, haunting voice. "There is a willow grows aslant a brook...
...same speech as if it were all beautiful, as if it were the ideal way to die." Next he had her read the passage with a sole concern for the horror of the narrative. Finally, "Make believe you're on the witness stand, being questioned about the drowning of Ophelia. Behave as though you killed her and are telling a false story...