I haven’t seen it yet, but I look forward to checking out Will Ferrell’s new film, “Stranger Than Fiction”. New York Times, Roger Ebert, and the Village Voice all seem to like it. Ebert almost gives it a rave, but then, he liked “Notebook”. The Village Voice is made of sterner stuff, so it’s relatively kind review got my attention.
I have a bit of dread of seeing comedians take on roles that they seem to think will establish them as “actors”. There’s a lot of ridiculously inane perception involved. Take a clown. Take away the big red nose. Have him recite poetry. The audience gasps. Art.
It’s like watching a famously great pianist perform. You watch the performance and think, what makes her great? It’s rhythm, right? It’s her feeling for the piece, her interpretation. It’s the way she takes you through a 20 minute sequence of notes and chords and makes it an experience that raises your consciousness.
But the audience is there to see the famous pianist. They will not be disappointed because everybody– the pianist, the conductor, the orchestra– they all know that the audience will not accept the greatness of the pianist unless she puts on a show of bombast and pyrotechnics and spectacular displays of speed and noise. Speed and noise. Most of the audience will never know if any two notes played in sequence are performed beautifully– but it knows that rapid arm movements up and down the keyboard signal virtuosity, and the rest is filled in by the critics, the filters, who ensure that no fakes get through. It would take an utterly remarkable artist to have the guts to come out and perform perfectly, beautifully, a delicate, quiet little song.
There is a bit of a paradox in the fact that comedians like Robin Williams and Jim Carrey feel a need to reign in the flamboyance in some roles in order to convey what they think will be perceived to be a more subtle, rich, and evocative performance. So a comedian who becomes well known for his outrageous, spontaneous, voracious absorption of popular kitsch– imitations, exaggeration, hype– seeks respect by annihilating his own personae. Robin Williams did this so successfully in “One Hour Photo” that he became a crashing bore. It appeared to me that he had confused restraint with subtlety. But there was nothing there in the end.
Helen Mirren’s performance in “The Queen” is exemplary of how it should be done. Never showy or ostentatious, but clearly defined, nuanced, and rich. She never seemed afraid to let you watch her think, or contemplate, or to watch her interact reasonably with others. There was no need for histrionics or flamboyance. She said everything with the way she twirled her pencil or stared up the woods on her Balmoral Estate.
The greatest rock album ever: maybe John Wesley Harding by Bob Dylan. But no one will ever notice it, because all the session musicians, Kenneth Buttrey and Charles McCoy, did, was accompany Dylan perfectly. No show. No ostentation. No schtick.