It’s natural to consider “Stage Beauty” a poor nephew to “Shakespeare in Love,” since both films are about the stage and sex and gender-bending roles.
“Stage Beauty” is an uneven movie by comparison with “Shakespeare.” But its pleasures are many, including a fine cast and chewy production values.
The story is set in London in 1661, an interesting moment in history and theater. The exiled Charles II had just returned to the throne after a period of Puritanism in England, and the theater flourished as a result.
Just as in Shakespeare’s time, female roles on stage were played by men. Edward Kynaston (played by Billy Crudup) was an actor who specialized in playing women. He was called “the loveliest woman on the stage” by the diarist Samuel Pepys.
The year 1661 was also the first time a woman played a female role on a London stage. The film, based on a play by Jeffrey Hatcher, stitches together these facts into an amusing fictional tale.
Kynaston finds his stage status threatened when his own wardrobe mistress, Maria (Claire Danes), acts the role of Desdemona in an underground production of “Othello.” Desdemona is Kynaston’s masterpiece.
“A woman playing a woman?” Kynaston muses. “Where’s the trick in that?” He’s honed the art of poses and glances; and he resents the idea that a woman might know anything about the art of it.
Complicating this is the attraction between Kynaston and Maria. His sexuality is ambivalent, as he has been having an affair with the Duke of Buckingham, but these two clearly have some heat together.
There’s something really absurd at the center of “Stage Beauty” that keeps it from being a great movie. Maria’s rebellion brings both feminism and modern Method acting into the 1660s, a historically impossible combo that makes the movie a fantasy.
But the arguments on the subject are absorbing. The film favors Maria’s urge to bring realistic emotion to the stage, but Kynaston’s insistence that there is an art to the artificial isn’t tossed on the ash heap.
Billy Crudup and Claire Danes fairly glow in these scenes, especially a sizzling rehearsal in which they break down the meanings of the murder sequence in “Othello.”
Small roles are expertly sketched, including Tom Wilkinson as the theater director and Hugh Bonneville as Pepys. And Rupert Everett has a high old time as Charles II – he almost seems to be channeling Vincent Price.
Director Richard Eyre (“Iris”) clearly has a talent for unleashing actors, and after all, that’s the subject of the movie. “Stage Beauty” has its flaws (I’m not sure I buy Crudup as a “lovely woman”), but it’s one of those rare films that gets better as it goes along.
“Stage Beauty” H H H
Gender bender: In England, 1661, where a presumptuous woman (Claire Danes) dares to play a woman on stage, much to the chagrin of a specialist in female roles (Billy Crudup). The film’s ideas are far too modern for its era, but it’s got a great cast and some well-written arguments.
Rated: R for nudity, subject matter.
Now showing: Harvard Exit
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