Word: priestleys
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...WRITE a play around an "idea" is a dangerous endeavor. All too often the characters flatten out and the dialogue begins to resemble a philosophy text. If the play somehow falls to convey its message, nothing remains. But J.B. Priestley's Time and the Conways proves that a well-crafted, realistic drama can lose its philosophical thrall and still provide a thought-provoking and enjoyable evening...
...Priestley's play succeeds because it presents much more than a quirky theory of time. The dialogue is always vibrant, regardless of the date, and the characters are vividly drawn people with distinct, realistic personalities. All one could have asked for from the script is a longer third act: Priestley is a bit utilitarian, presenting episodes that neatly explain how the Conways' individual fortunes began their downward spiral, but are thin on the rich incidental action he writes so well...
...Priestley...
...from the suave image of a Leonard Bernstein. Yet as his baton comes slashing down with swift, chopping strokes, he is abruptly transformed into a figure of grace. Cuing the orchestra, effortlessly guiding singers through an opera's trickiest passages, joyfully but inaudibly singing along, he has become Priestley's ideal personified. And why not? James Levine, 39, is doing what he was born...
...else is ready for beatification? Some think Robert Penn Warren. Ralph Ellison, for one book, Invisible Man (1952). J B. Priestley? Alberto Moravia? Doris Lessing? Graham Greene? Jorge Luis Borges? The morally imposing Alexander Sofehenitsyn? Yes Certainly Samuel Beckett, the muttering old codger of modernism, who changed the spiritual and theatrical décor of the 20th century...