The Year of Magical Thinking

August 20, 2007 by dennisbaker 

It has been a year since I moved to New Jersey and I still had not seen a broadway show. That ended last Tuesday. It was the last week for the play, A Year of Magical Thinking, a new play written by Joan Didion based on her celebrated memoir, starring one of the world’s greatest living actresses, the Academy Award and Tony Award winner Vanessa Redgrave. The play is directed by Academy Award and Tony Award nominee David Hare.

Ms. Redgrave relives an almost unfathomably shocking period in Joan Didion’s life. Capturing the compassion, humor and bewilderment of a fiercely intelligent woman whose world lurches suddenly from the ordinary to the unimaginable, The Year of Magical Thinking is a love letter to a child and a tribute to an extraordinary, unconventional marriage, told with raw candor and a brilliant storyteller’s gift for the absurd.

I was able to purchase student tickets that morning. I sat second row, far left. It was great to be so close since it was a one woman show. Ms. Redgrave talked to the audience and being so close there were moments it felt she was talking directly to me. Her blue eyers were piercing. I could imagine how easy it would be as an actor to play opposite her. Being so close I felt like a participant. There was so much depth in her gaze that it drew me in and brought emotion out of me.

We were told that the play was not a good interpretation of the book. As I do want to read the book, I am glad I did not read it before the show. I was able to enter the story innocent waiting to hear what would happen and how it would end. It was magical!

Filed under: Acting, New York
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Read/Watch/Listen

August 5, 2007 by dennisbaker 

I just got done reading Declan Donnellan’s book, The Actor and the Target. It is one of the best books I read about acting. He addresses major questions actors deal with when working on a role and then proceeds to change the actor’s viewpoint in how to ask the question and then how to respond it it. My notes are too long to type and I will not do it justice. Cheek by Jowl, Donnellan’s theater company, has a good review and excerpts from the book. Go check it out!

Debby Allen wrote an article about me before I left for New Jersey. She has republished it over at The People’s Media Company. It was originally written for our church blog.

I came across a pretty cool website, American Theater Wing. They are the organization that created the Tony awards. They produce various television and radio interviews from the New York theater community. It is worth to see some great interviews. I just watched the interview with Jeff Daniels (”Blackbird”), Brian Dennehy (”Inherit the Wind”), Liev Schreiber (”Talk Radio”) and Kevin Spacey (”A Moon for the Misbegotten”). They discuss a wide array of topics, including whether the prefer rehearsal to performance, their experience in long runs and how great plays can carry actors along, the acting opportunities of appearing in many plays by the same author, how they find new challenges, whether they can still enjoy theatre as a member of the audience, and if its harder to do their work now that they’re well known.

Filed under: Acting, Books, New York
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