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ANew Hamlet For The '90's Opens
Academy Award Winner Kim Hunter Will Star In The Cocktail Hour
The Public's Spectacular Season "This is not museum theater," says Ron Daniels, director of Hamlet, which opens the Public's new season . "It looks modern. Its feel is modern." Daniels, who directed the widely praised 1989 version of Hamlet for England's Royal Shakespeare Company, is out to change your perception of Shakespeare. Daniels will team with Antony McDonald, designer of the RSC's Hamlet, for the Public's production October 10 through November 17. It will be an historic collaboration between PPT and Boston's prestigious American Repertory Theatre. With McDonald's bold and creative set, and costume styles that range from Hamlet's time through the 1930's, 40's and 50 's to fashions of today, this production of Hamlet is by no means the " stodgy, aca-Oem·,c p1ay everyone thinks of when they think of Hamlet," adds Daniels. "It is a modern story, hugely complex and resonant and it affects us all. It is amazingly contemporary and recognizable." Daniels feels that most of Shakespeare's plays focus on the portrayal of family life and anxieties within the family. Since everybody has had their share of family problems and has experienced the trials of growing up and trying to find themselves, Daniels believes
that everyone can understand Shakespeare on a very basic level. "I hope that every child and parent will recognize aspects of the production with which they can relate.'' Hamlet, a rebellious youth suspected of going mad by the Danish court, is described by Daniels as an adolescent undergoing severe domestic strains who intends to mock the system. Played by such renowned artists as Laurence Olivier, Peter O'Toole, Richard Burton, John Gielgud , Michael Redgrave and Paul Scofield, the role of Hamlet is one of the most powerful and challenging in dramatic history. Mark Rylance, who will play the title role at the Public, accepted the challenge in 1989 when Daniels chose him for the Royal Shakespeare Company's production of Hamlet. Daniels knew Rylance could aspire to such a role when he saw him as Ariel in the RSC 's production of The Tempest nearly nine years ago. " I realized Mark was at the stage in his career where his intel ligence, emotional life, technical capacity and power to enrich every moment of his life on stage was incredible." Rylance, who received rave reviews as Hamlet in Stratford-on-Avon and London , admits the role is indeed intimidating, especially since "more has been written about it than the Bible." Performing Hamlet over 190 times within the past two years, Rylance, who was born in England but raised in Wisconsin, first played Hamlet at age 16 in a high school production at the University School in Milwaukee. Returning to England in 1978 for formal training at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art, Rylance went on to work with the Royal Shakespeare Company, performing major roles in productions such as The Tempest, Continued on page 2
Mark Rylance stars as Hamlet at the Public.
Public Perspective
September-October 1991
Kim Hunter as Stella Kowalski and Marlon Brando as her husband Stanley in the 1951 film classic A Streetcar Named Desire. Ask film or theater fans the world over what they think of when they hear the words ''.A Streetcar Named Desire" and most will affect a Brooklyn accent and scream "Stelllahhhhh!" They're calling Kim Hunter and they can find her at the Public March 5 through April 12 in A.A. Gurney's hit comedy The Cocktail Hour. Hunter originated the role of Stella Kowalski opposite Marlon Brando, Jessica Tandy and Karl Malden in the legendary 1947 debut of Tennessee Williams' A Streetcar Named Desire directed by Elia Kazan . Hunter won the Variety New York Critics' Poll for her stage performance of Stella, and went on to win the Oscar and Golden Globe Awards for Best Supporting Actress when she reprised the role in the classic 1951 film version of Streetcar that co-starred Brando, Malden and Vivien Leigh . In The Cocktail Hour, Hunter portrays the wryly witty Ann, whose playwright son John rattles his upper-middle-class WASP family during one of their beloved cocktail hours with news that he's written a play based on their lives. Armed with a wellspring of zingers, it is Ann's job to placate her outraged husband Bradley, who thinks his son is out to publicly humiliate him in his old age: "Is it all right if he puts us in a book, Bradley?", and her insulted daughter Nina, who's been reduced to a " relatively minor role" in the play: "Sounds like you're lucky, dear." Ann's deadpan delivery and precise comic timing provoke continuous bursts of laughter throughout The Cocktail Hour.
Pittsburgh Public Theater • Pagel
Aside from Streetcar, Kim Hunter is widely remembered for her portrayal of the humane psychologist Dr. Zira opposite Charlton Heston and Roddy McDowell in the 1968 fifm classic Planet Of The Apes and thesequels Beneath The Planet Of The Apes and Escape From The Planet Of The Apes. Other film cred its include Stairway To Heaven with David Niven (released in Britain as A Matter Of Life And Death), The Swimmer with Burt Lancaster, and Two Evil Eyes with Harvey Keitel, which was filmed in Pittsburgh and is pending release later this year. On television, Hunter has been seen in hundreds of programs from the early days of "live" TV through guest-starring roles on such recent shows as Murder, She Wrote. Hunter has twice been nominated for an Emmy Award: for her performances as Crazy Annie in Baretta and Nola Madison on The Edge Of Night. In a stage career that has spanned over 40 years, Hunter has starred again and again on Broadway and in regional theaters across the country. Notable Broadway credits include Darkness At Noon with Claude Rains, The Children's Hour with Patricia Neal, and the comedies The Tender Trap ilith Robert Preston and Two Blind Mice with Melvyn Douglas. Her many regional starring roles include Linda Loman in Death Of A Salesman at Ontario, Canada's renowned Stratford Festival, and Big Mama in Cat On A Hot Tin Roof at the Coconut Grove Playhouse for which she won Florida's CarContinued on page 2