Glenda Jackson and Adam Driver: Performers With a License to Rage
Expect the canyons of Broadway to echo with shouts and screams this spring — and moaning and groaning and lamentation of an exceptional amplitude and ferocity. And I’m not referring to ticket buyers who have just registered what an orchestra seat will set them back, or not only that.
Rather, I’m referring to two stars, much celebrated for their combustible presences on stage and screen, who will be taking on parts in which being able to generate high dudgeon at high volume is a primary job requirement. That would be the British actress Glenda Jackson, in the rage-filled title role of Shakespeare’s “King Lear,” and the unlikely American heartthrob Adam Driver, who is portraying what might be described as an emotional arsonist in the first Broadway revival of Lanford Wilson’s 1987 drama “Burn This.”
As is the case with many of this season’s main-stem offerings, the road to New York for this “King Lear” and “Burn This” has hardly been a straight line. They’re each arriving later than was originally anticipated — and in somewhat altered form.
Lear is the part in which the then 80-year-old Ms. Jackson, a two-time Oscar winner who had left acting to become a member of Parliament, returned to the London stage after an absence of more than two decades. That production, directed by Deborah Warner at the Old Vic in 2016, reaped such ecstatic notices for its star that it was widely assumed it would be crossing the Atlantic posthaste.
Ms. Jackson did indeed show up on Broadway a little more than a year later. But it was not as Shakespeare’s ultimate angry old man but as the angry old woman of Edward Albee’s “Three Tall Women,” for which Ms. Jackson won a Tony for Best Actress in a Play.
Now, a mere (and one hopes, for her, very restful) year later, Ms. Jackson will be reincarnating the most challenging role in the Shakespeare canon, but with a different director and supporting cast. The “King Lear” opening in April at the Cort Theater will be staged by Sam Gold, who showed an original and subversive hand for Shakespeare in starry productions of “Othello,” with Daniel Craig and David Oyelowo, and “Hamlet,” in which Oscar Isaac was the Prince of Denmark. (His “Lear” casts Ruth Wilson as both the King’s Fool and one of his daughters.)
“Burn This,” an intense, four-character study of love and grief in a New York loft, had been expected to come to the Hudson Theater in early 2017. That production was to be headlined by Jake Gyllenhaal — in the role of a foul-mouthed, cocaine-hoovering restaurateur named Pale — and directed by Michael Mayer. It was subsequently announced that because of “scheduling conflicts with the show’s star,” the opening of “Burn This” would probably be “during the 2017-2018 season.”
The version of “Burn This” finally scheduled to open on April 16 will, as promised, be staged by Mr. Mayer at the Hudson. But its Pale is now Mr. Driver, playing opposite Keri Russell as a dancer in mourning (for her recently deceased roommate, Pale’s brother).
Mr. Driver will be competing with cherished memories of John Malkovich, whose scorching performance as Pale 32 years ago sealed his reputation as a dominating star. Theatergoers still talk about Mr. Malkovich’s splenetic, warp-speed opening monologue.
Though Mr. Driver has appeared on New York stages before — notably in revivals of “Look Back in Anger” (directed by Mr. Gold in 2012) and Terence Rattigan’s “Man and Boy” (2011) — it was in supporting roles of relative calm, meant to ballast the showier, fierier leading parts played by Matthew Rhys (in “Anger”) and Frank Langella (in “Man”).
But anyone doubting Mr. Driver’s ability to do bad, mad and dangerous need only take a look at his subsequent screen work, including his turn as the arch-villain Kylo Ren in the recent “Star Wars” films. Or check out his set-incinerating fight with Jemima Kirke in the Season 5 finale of HBO’s “Girls.” Theatergoers attending “Burn This” might do well to wear asbestos.
As for Ms. Jackson, no one has doubted her capacity for delivering annihilating rage since she destroyed the hulking Oliver Reed in Ken Russell’s 1969 film of “Women in Love.” Nor should anyone question this octogenarian’s capacity to “howl, howl, howl” nightly against the bleak and cruel universe of “Lear.”
Speaking last year of her performance as Lear in London, Ms. Jackson said matter-of-factly, “I expected to do it eight times a week, because that’s the way I’ve been raised. When the first additional matinee went in, the whole cast was asking me how I was, they were afraid I was going to die in the middle of it.
“The only time I ever felt tired was on Sundays when we didn’t have to do it. Because there’s so much energy in the play,” she said.
Cosmic rage, it would appear, is a great rejuvenator.
Adam Levine and His Wife Just Threw the Sweetest Party for Their Daughter’s First Birthday
From Country Living
Behati Prinsloo and Adam Levine celebrated their daughter's first birthday this weekend with an adorable party. Prinsloo and Levine, who married in Mexico in 2014 (per People), have two daughters together-one-year-old Gio, and two-year-old Dusty Rose Levine.
Marking their youngest daughter's first birthday, Prinsloo shared a photo of a beautifully decorated room, the ceiling of which was covered in multi-colored balloons. While gold helium balloons spelled out the message, "Gio is 1," Prinsloo wrote on Instagram, "My little GG is 1 👽i love you":
The Victoria's Secret model also added an adorable video of Gio bouncing around on her Instagram story, writing: "Can’t believe my little alien is 1 today. Love you baby GG."
Earlier this month, Levine's family supported him as his band, Maroon 5, played the Super Bowl Halftime Show. Sharing a gorgeous photo of her two girls watching their dad perform on TV, Prinsloo captioned the post, "We love you dada❤️!!!! #superbowl53":
Speaking about starting a family with the musician, Prinsloo previously told People, "I think for both of us, we’re just so obsessed with being a family and having a family-seeing this next step in our life."
For more royals and can't-miss fashion and beauty news, sign up for the Harper's BAZAAR Newsletter.
SUBSCRIBE
('You Might Also Like',)
New Avengers Theory Brings Adam Warlock Into Endgame
Adam Warlock's shadow has been looming over the Marvel Cinematic Universe ever since James Gunn introduced the character in Guardians of the Galaxy 2. It is expected that Adam, who is a big part of the Infinity War comics, will have a large part to play in the future of the MCU, but will he be further introduced in Avengers: Endgame? A new theory suggests that he and Vision might have a pretty big role to play in the movie and how it sets up Phase 4 of the MCU.
Infinity War sees Vision go through quite a bit, but we also learned that he and the Mind Stone were evolving. Thanos and his Black Order are coming for the Infinity Stones and Vision wants to remove and destroy the Mind Stone, in an effort to keep Thanos from achieving his goal. While in Wakanda and deciding whether or not taking the stone out of his head will kill him, Bruce Banner explains that there's a good chance that Vision with survive. He explains.
"Your mind is made up of a complex construct of overlays. JARVIS, Ultron, Tony, me, the Stone. All of them mixed together, all of them learning from one another... if we take out the Stone, there's still a whole lot of Vision left. Perhaps the best parts."
With that being said, there have been more than a few theories that state Vision is taking on the Adam Warlock storyline for the MCU. However, this could also mean that Infinity Stones are able to be given to other characters to take on their soul, much like what Warlock did in the comics. Warlock has the Soul Stone embedded in his head and then collects the scattered stones to hand them out to the right souls, allowing them to, "lead their own individual lives. Write their own destinies."
This could mean that the Infinity Stones going forth after Avengers: Endgame are all living entities while bringing Adam Warlock into the MCU. There are some problems with this theory. For one, the Russo Brothers claim that Warlock will not be in Endgame because they don't want to do a direct adaptation of the comic book source material, which makes complete sense. However, a lot has changed, especially with Guardians of the Galaxy 3 being on hold.
Related: Endgame Meets Aladdin Fan Art Turns Will Smith's Genie Into Thanos
Additionally, the Russo Brothers have been known to throw out some misdirects. For instance, Avengers: Endgame was guessed as the title pretty much right away, but the directing duo shot it down and said that the title was not uttered during Infinity War. Obviously, they couldn't come out and say that at the time, it would've blown the whole secret. They might be doing the same thing with Adam Warlock in Avengers: Endgame, we'll just have to wait and see. This fan theory was originally presented by Screen Rant.
Topics: Avengers 4, Avengers.
No comments:
Post a Comment