Word: playing
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Dates: during 1950-1959
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...minutes in the second act, the audience sits fascinated as Annie teaches Helen to fold her napkin and to eat with a spoon; not a word is spoken. The performances of Miss Bancroft and Miss Duke so stand out that they obscure several other important assets. First, Gibson's play is astoundingly free of the oversentimentality that could so easily bog down an enterprise of this kind. Second, the rest of the cast, particularly Patricia Neal as Helen's mother and James Congdon as her half-brother, is very fine. Certain minor defects are also obscured: Torin Thatcher, as Helen...
...Miracle Worker is reminiscent of another play about a famous recovery from handicap, Dore Schary's Sunrise at Campobello. Both have the advantage of a ready-made, well-known story, of ready-made audience sympathy. But Gibson's task is a far more demanding one: while Schary could work with the breezy personality of the adult F.D.R., Gibson has as his heroine a six-year-old girl who cannot speak a word. There is, of course, the wonderful Annie, beautifully played by Miss Bancroft, but Helen remains the central figure, an unusual and tremendously difficult character...
Gibson is extraordinarily lucky to have the assistance of Penn as director and of Patty Duke in the role of Helen. Since Helen cannot speak, her every movement must convey something to the audience; Helen cannot be played as a mere dumb animal, for the entire play is meant to prove that there is something inside her, waiting to be released. Under Penn's direction, Miss Duke is more than a success in this awfully taxing part; without ever uttering a word, she is the most memorable child actress to appear in years...
...chief inspiration of this play by Joe Master-off is the tale of Cinderella, and for those who might otherwise miss this point, Julie Harris, as Ruth Arnold, mentions the fact several times per act. Of course, there is a switch to the fairy tale: Cinderella doesn't marry the Prince (who proves something of a scoundrel) but rather weds plain old Richard in Milwaukee...
Julie Harris, as a lonely and homely woman seeking a husband in America's sunshine capital, is immensely appealing in the central role. But the play itself is a travesty, a trite rehash of travel-folder propaganda and True Love Confessions, with a heavy touch of Pamela. The problems the play poses and agonizes could be solved with a quick letter to Dear Abby...