Word: stage
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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BOSTON--The Massachusetts House has approved a $365 million deficit-reduction bill that sets the stage for higher taxes but falls short of wiping out an estimated $721 million state deficit...
Call it by its rightful name, Les Liaisons Dangereuses. Call it Dangerous Liaisons. Call it, if you must, Valmont. But in any case it looks as if we can now call it a day for stage and movie adaptations of Pierre-Ambroise-Francois Choderlos de Laclos's intricate, instructive novel of sexual gamesmanship among the 18th century French aristocracy. For Milos Forman and Jean-Claude Carriere, while fiddling with the plot of this deliciously nasty tale, have studiously embalmed its spirit. Valmont arrives stiffened by the elegant, inert formalism of Forman's direction, and chilled by Carriere...
...stylized bitchiness of Harling's writing requires a stage setting. Failing that, it requires a director willing to let his actors throw good lines away or overlap them in ways that work in the movie's naturalistic context. But Herbert Ross insists on theatricality. His editing even provides awkward little pauses for the audience to fill with laughter, just as if this were still a play. As a result, some very good performers (Shirley MacLaine, Olympia Dukakis, Daryl Hannah, Dolly Parton) function less as full-scale sorority sisters than as chorus members who elbow their way up front...
Becky, Hoss' girlfriend, is played by Susan Levine. Relatively unexciting during the first act, Levine makes Becky shine in the second act, even though she has considerably less stage time. The tense scene in which she struggles alone against an imaginary, lust-ridden boy reveals Levine to be an actress of unflinching talent...
...Blackstone undertakes the role of Crow, Hoss' rival, in the second act, during which he dominates the dialogue and stage. Disconcerting and annoyingly weasel-like at first, Crow grows on the audience throughout the second act. By the end, Blackstone completely eclipses Preven, who meets his demise, both literally and in his ability to maintain the audience's attention. It is especially difficult to take one's eyes off Blackstone's Crow during his duel scene with Hoss in the second act, an emotional moment that showcases superb acting and choreography as the two main characters engage in a battle...