Callas, Streep, and "Master Class"
Thursday, June 19, 2014 at 1:37PM 
Tyne Daly played the role on BroadwayYou've undoubtedly heard the news by now that Meryl Streep will be playing opera diva Maria Callas in the film adaptation of the play Master Class, about Callas teaching a voice class at Juilliard. Well, telefilm adaptation I guess... so ink Streep down for the Emmy whenever that arrives since Hollywood is all about over-rewarding the winners. On stage the role has been played by Fanny Ardant, Zoe Caldwell, Faye Dunaway and Tyne Daly. Master Class is, in a way, a distant cousin to The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie as each involve an imperious older woman teaching students while also basically monologuing about her own glory days.
Terence McNally's play has been around since 1995 and as recently as last Winter Faye Dunaway, who played the role in a Los Angeles production, was still being interviewed about her struggle to get it on film. If Dunaway was that invested in it I'm confused about the rights issues because wouldn't she have already acquired them?
As much as I love Streep, her dominance continues to haunt me. I'm an actressexual but I am in no way monogamous about it. (I assure you, 1000% percent that if my beloved Pfeiffer returned to the movies and got every part for a 50something woman, I'd complain, too.) And while I despair for the other supremes Streep's age who can't get around her to get their shot at golden roles (both because Hollywood always wants Streep and because Streep is more prolific now than she has been since her late twenties!), this could be truly great. Mike Nichols is Streep's best collaborator and truly gifted at guiding her. Streep has rarely been better than she was in Silkwood, Postcards from the Edge, and Angels in America. I'd list only two of her other performances as equal to that realm of pure transcendence.
Maria Callas
That said it'd be more tantalizing, at least from afar, to have a lesser lauded less ubiquitous performer and it'd definitely be fascinating to have a "has been" goddess in the role. Consider that on Broadway one of the raves for Daly's performance said:
one of the most haunting portraits I’ve seen of life after stardom
Not that Streep doesn't have prodigious gifts of imagination but "life after stardom" is not something the three time Oscar winner has or ever will experience, despite it being a universal journey for 98% of movie actresses.
Reader Comments (68)
Nat- I am not just talking voice performances... I am talking about films you included like Evening and Rendition and Lemony Snicket and Homesman... Movies in which she lends her considerable talent to cameo like roles such as The Giver - which she completed in a week. True starring turns for a 64 year old are hard to get and for an audience to want to pay to see- and she deserves every offer that comes her way- that is what 18 Oscar nomination and 3 wins get you
Sonja -- totally agree. she's a LEGEND. and i love her. and people don't get that because i have meryl fatigue but my life wouldn't be the same without her. she's in my top ten movie stars of all time. I would be salivating for every meryl performance if she worked just a little less but the performances have lost the element of surprise and EVENT status... at least for me.
it's like cate blanchett for me (although i never really loved blanchett) in that there was a time that i was just like OMGSTOPYOUAREINEVERYTHING and then she went away briefly and when she came back. holy hell. Blue Jasmine was such an event performance. I miss that with Meryl. I'd love to see another BRIDGES or ADAPTATION or ANGELS IN AMERICA or DEVIL WEARS PRADA event performance again. But that requires being surprised or having totally missed the person.
jeff -- that's a good point. Hollywood needs to put out more roles for that age range of actresses so that meryl couldn't possibly find time to do them all ;) then we'd have a healthy actress cinema for women 50+
mark -- the other two performances i was alluding to are PRADA & SOPHIE'S CHOICE
I do not think Meryl is working to make EVENT performances... She is simply doing her job, supporting her kids and sculptor husband and probably trying to make a nice retirement nest egg . In 10 years- I bet she will start I slow down and as the roles for 70 year old are not as abundant ... I am enjoying this golden age of Streep while it lasts..
Well Nat, I WAS surprised by her turns in TIL or A:OC. Both were more layered and deeper than I expected. Both complicated women, both "Monsters", but there's something else.
Or Mamma Mia! tbh.
I mean in that she was just huge FUN. No more, no less. I understand why people hat that film, but I simply love it. LOVE it. And her Miranda Priestly was a 1000 times better than the novel-Miranda.
I ADORE her in Adaptation. I so wished she had won for that, Nat. But the sad truth is: she didn't.
She didn't won for all these roles listed except thankfully Angels in America. A Masterpiece directed by Mike Nichols.
Actually every movie she made with Nichols is great, yes, that includes Heartburn. I think it's underrated. A great comedy, even though it was labeled as "drama".
Ah, were was I... Oh yes, great performances over the years that didn't win anything. like Bridges. I know awards don't matter every time, but why didn't she win anything for it?
And here is another sad truth: performances like that are hardly available when you pass the 50's.
You compare her to Cate Blanchett's Blue Jasmine? There you have it. Blanchett is 45, twenty years younger than Meryl. Meryl was 45 when she did Bridges. Blanchett had the best timing and won everything. Good for her. Though her and any other actress' future is still not "safe" by any means. But maybe the industry changes. It slowly does.
Here's to hope they can all work like steamroller Streep in her mid-sixties.
And here's of course hope to you that "Master Class" could be the surprising turn of Meryl you're waiting for again.
Hope dies last, doesn't it?
Isn't Faye Dunaway damn near 80 by now? Where is the doom and gloom dread for her taking on the Maria Callas role? Why does she get a break? B/c Meryl "stole" the role from her? That's so disingenuous. It's a role Dunaway doesn't really "have," and even if she did, no one owns any role, and that's even more true for theater parts. So whatever. I wish Meryl the best. She's going to kill it, again!
Rian -- nowhere in the article does it say anything about Streep "stealing" a role. I merely posed the question of 'what happened to the rights?' because Dunaway was working on it, wouldn't she own them? and yes you can actually own a part (at least in the movies). That's what buying the rights to something is for.
i wish Meryl the best too, always.
Don't let the Meryl fanatics bully you! You're absolutely right and you know it!
Boring casting choice nº201
Okay, that's fair. I was thinking more of theater where no one owns any parts. Has Dunaway actually filmed anything of this? Or is her involvement more development/wish fulfillment? If that's the case and she doesn't own the rights, then nothing was stolen from her b/c it wasn't hers to begin with. How else can Streep and Nichols now work on it? And my larger point was about the age issue more than Streep fatigue. If Streep isn't suitable for this role b/c of age, then Dunaway really isn't suited for this role. Where's the hate there, you know? I think Streep is going to be great, and at this point in her career, she can do what she damn well pleases. I'd like to think that her "contemporaries" are gracious enough to be happy that one of their own is prospering like this (signaling that maybe it could happen for them too if the stars aligned), not jealous over perceived slights and could-have-been roles for them. Look at what Jessica Lange is doing right now on television, for example.
Jalen, I don't think you work in the same Hollywood I do. I'm pretty sure there is quite a bit of weeping and gnashing of teeth by other actresses as far as Meryl is concerned. :-)
Since everyone in America thinks everyone in Europe just has a foreign accent, what I wouldn't give to see Isabelle Huppert in this role. Otherness, daring, imperiousness, and vulnerability. Oh man.
Dave, Huppert would be sublime! She really shook me in Amour.
Damn, would love to see Lange or Close in this. Also, I think Christine Lahti would kill it.
The Dunaway version, despite her age, still fascinates me.
@Nat
You yourself have contradicted yourself ...
If in 30 years she has done 27 movies... does that not figure on average of 1 a year
Now... my point stands along with the other bloggers!
Also, don't deny you are PAST Streep fatigue ...
I'd like to think that her "contemporaries" are gracious enough to be happy that one of their own is prospering like this (signaling that maybe it could happen for them too if the stars aligned), not jealous over perceived slights and could-have-been roles for them. Look at what Jessica Lange is doing right now on television, for example.
None of her contemporaries want to work and not be noticed. Most of what they are doing is in thankless nothing roles because that is all that is available to them. While quality material is on TV. It remains TV and will never have the allure of Theatrical film releases. Where Streep is allowed to take every role for older actresses that are not given to foreign talents. Some of them fucking hate her. And I do not blame them a bit. She stole Viola's dream and crushed Glenn Close with a huge smile on her face. This is for my husband and makeup man. Bitch.
3rtful
You are still such a bitter man ... it is unbelievable that you are "into the heads" of these women and fantasize on what is happening in their "real" life ... stick to their "reel" life ...
to me that is what movies are about ... not getting a nasty hardon for one person and continuallly
dwelling on her... Get a life
I love these Streep posts. They're so divisive yet attract the most traffic. Yes, there are bitter people who visit and post. It's the same people, again and again. Never, ever a kind word to say about Streep.
Question: When was the last time Streep made a telefilm? Give the lady a break already.
@3rtful: Hopefully Viola Davis and Glenn Close aren't as bitter as you are about a situation that is out of Meryl's hands (blame the "unimaginative" casting directors and producers who want to make bank, not Streep for accepting said roles to stay creatively fulfilled). And the both of them have thrived on television (or let's say, "will thrive" in Viola's case). There's not a damn thing wrong with going to television nowadays either. That's where the talent and work is. Hopefully they're gracious enough to do their work without being as petty and childish about it. They seem to be doing just fine. Learn from them and stop being so bitter.
Can I just say two things? ;-)
One: Meryl doesn't "steal" roles and awards. She neither nominates nor votes herself to victory, and her casting is the reason some of those films got made in the first place.
Two: I don't understand Streep Fatigue. In her almost 40-year screen career, she has about 70 credits as an actress, which means less than two projects a year on average, and that includes cameos, supporting roles, television roles, voice work and filmed stage performances. I'd call that steady, but not oversaturated. What I sometimes have is Streep Disappointment or Streep Frustration: I don't like all of her output, and I wish she had turned down some of those roles—not out of altruism towards her peers, but in order to have done other, more interesting things instead.
Nathaniel, I think your number 1 problem is that you are not an actor.
Even if you're trying to develop some sort of understanding how hard it is, you actually have no idea, because you're not out there on the market:
-either as a jobbing actor who's trying to pay his rent while also earning some creative satisfaction;
-or as the STAR who is patiently awaiting that ONE ROLE per year which combines - good writing + a decent director + a good producer + potential to be seen by people.
Any Streep-fatigue people might be talking about is due to the Oscar factor, that the ONE ROLE per year quite often gets Nominated, that's what pissess some people off, not the amount of roles that go Streep's way.
Meryl is a champ, and I don't see why an actor should be working less as they age. All of her kids are "out of the house" as she's described it and now she's completely free to commit to her career.