Blueprints: "Rent"

To celebrate Pride Month, every week of June Jorge has been highlighting the script of a movie that focuses on a different letter of the LGBT acronym. For “B”, he goes back to the film adaptation of one of the most seminal modern musicals, and dissects a number about our favorite bi heartbreaker.

It’s no surprise that it was astoundingly hard to find a movie to discuss that had an openly bisexual lead or prominently supporting character. Bisexuals have had the most lackluster representation in movies among the LGBT community. Usually bisexuality onscreen is only implied and never openly identified as such. To find a strong bi character, I had to go back to something that wasn’t initially a film, but a theater piece; the theater has always been ahead of films when it comes to LGBT representation.

Even though Jonathan Larson’s Rent has not aged particularly well, it did feature an incredibly diverse cast in race and sexuality; from a trans woman of color to a black lesbian, and from your token white guys to, of course, the bi lady to end all bi ladies: Maureen Johnson...

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Months of Meryl: Dancing at Lughnasa (1998)

John and Matthew are watching every single live-action film starring Meryl Streep. 

 

#25 — Kate Mundy, the elder head of a matriarchal clan in Ireland’s County Donegal circa 1936.

MATTHEW: Dancing at Lughnasa continues the sporadic but prestigious practice, begun by Plenty and leading up to August: Osage County, of Meryl Streep headlining big-ticket Broadway plays in screen adaptations that tend to do a disservice to the often truncated works whose very suitability for such stage-to-cineplex transfers feels rather strained. (Angels in America, made for HBO, is obviously a highly distinguished exception.) These films are greenlit as glorified acting showcases in the hopes of magnetizing a similar haul of trophies as their acclaimed theatrical predecessors. They may feature some fine, forceful performances (from Streep and several others), but their claims as cinema remain dubious at best.

I’m always curious about why Streep seldom returns to her first love, the stage, especially when one considers that the actress’ greatest role in the last decade was not Susan Orlean, Clarissa Vaughan, or Miranda Priestley, but Bertolt Brecht’s Mother Courage, whose wagon of wares Streep took up for a 2006 Shakespeare in the Park production, four years after playing Irina in The Seagull for the same summer series...

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Stage Door: Anika Noni Rose Brings Raw Sensuality to "Carmen Jones" Off Broadwa

Stage Door is our intermittent theater column in which we often feature plays and musicals with film connections. Please welcome guest contributor Erica Mann...

The moment Carmen Jones walks onto the stage of Classic Stage Company, it’s like time completely stops. It’s not just because the character is played by the incomparable Anika Noni Rose whose illustrious career has spanned stage (a Tony win for Caroline or Change), TV (Bates Motel, The Good Wife), and film (Dreamgirls, For Colored Girls, The Princess and the Frog). Her presence as the namesake is that powerful from the moment she sets foot into the spotlight.

Oscar Hammerstein II's adaptation of Bizet's opera Carmen became a classic screen musical in 1954 starring Dorothy Dandridge and Harry Belafonte but has rarely been seen on the NY stage. CSC's production is the first major New York revival since the 1940s. Carmen Jones is the story of love, lust, betrayal and tragedy with the action moved to the 1940s in the American south. Corporal Joe, stationed at an army reserve and working in a parachute factory, falls in love with the stunning Carmen Jones. Aware of his feelings, Carmen convinces him to change his life trajectory in pursuit for a life in Chicago with her. Things change when those initial feelings become blurry and passion turns into jealousy...

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List-Mania: Glenda Jackson & Lots of Triple-Crown Acting Trivia

This is a update/reworking of two previous posts about Triple Crowns!

Glenda Jackson is the oldest performer (82) to complete the Triple Crown

Since I'm on record as being annoyed that all anyone cares about is the EGOT it's time to celebrate our preferred obsession: The Triple Crown of Acting. That's when a performer manages the Emmy, Oscar, and Tony. To date only 24 actors* have accomplished this, with Glenda Jackson being the most recent recipient as of this past Sunday night at the Tony Awards. Triple Crowns have become much more commonplace in the 21st century since actors move much more fluidly through the three mediums than they did in before the turn of the century. TV has totally lost its stigma for movie stars and Broadway is more welcome to very short runs freeing major stars up to continue with their movie and TV careers without as much scheduling trauma.  A TRUCKLOAD OF TRIVIA AFTER THE JUMP...

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Tony Awards 2018 in Review

Thirteen random thoughts on last night's Tony Awards.

• Glenda Jackson won the Emmy and two Oscars in the 1970s but after a three decade break from acting, she returns triumphant with a Tony win, giving her the Triple Crown!

• Remember when Melissa McCarthy surprised everybody by winning the Emmy for Mike & Molly that one year? After the shock wore off everyone collectively decided that the Television Academy gave her that prize because of Bridesmaids that same season. I kinda think this is what happened with Laurie Metcalf winning a second consecutive Tony -- this time for Three Tall Women in a category people expected to go elsewhere. Not that Three Tall Women isn't brilliantly acted, but we're guessing her miracle performance in Lady Bird helped put her over the finish line. We're choosing to interpret it as Tony voters slapping Oscar's hand. Oscar deserved a slap for that one...

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