• Home
  • About
    • About Last Night
    • Terry Teachout
    • Contact
  • AJBlogCentral
  • ArtsJournal

About Last Night

Terry Teachout on the arts in New York City

You are here: Home / 2018 / February / Archives for 26th

Archives for February 26, 2018

Just because: Maurice Evans’ Macbeth

February 26, 2018 by Terry Teachout

TV CAMERAA rare kinescope of an abridged TV version of William Shakespeare’s Macbeth, starring Maurice Evans and Dame Judith Anderson and directed by George Schaefer. This performance was originally telecast live by NBC on November 28, 1954, as an episode of Hallmark Hall of Fame:

(This is the latest in a series of arts-related videos that appear in this space each Monday, Wednesday, and Friday)

Almanac: How Charles Laughton gave James Garner an acting lesson

February 26, 2018 by Terry Teachout

INK BOTTLE“Though I was still prone to stage fright, I jumped at the chance to work with the great English actor who’d created such unforgettable roles as Captain Bligh in Mutiny on the Bounty and Quasimodo in The Hunchback of Notre Dame.

“One morning when we were still in rehearsals, Laughton said, ‘James, I’d like you to come up to the house and lunch with me.’

“I was sure he was going to can me, because I knew I wasn’t very good.

“After lunch, he said, ‘James, do you know what your problem is?’

“‘No, sir, I don’t.’

“‘You’re afraid to be bad, and therefore you don’t do anything. You stay in the middle of the road. You’re not dull, but you aren’t interesting, either.’

“It shook me to the core, but I knew he was right. I didn’t care if the audience liked me, I just didn’t want them to dislike me, and so I underplayed everything. I didn’t want to do anything that might alienate them. As a result, I was mediocre.”

James Garner and Jon Winokur, The Garner Files: A Memoir (Garner played the part of Maryk in a 1955 road-show production of The Caine Mutiny Court-Martial, directed by Laughton)

Terry Teachout

Terry Teachout, who writes this blog, is the drama critic of The Wall Street Journal and the critic-at-large of Commentary. In addition to his Wall Street Journal drama column and his monthly essays … [Read More...]

About

About “About Last Night”

This is a blog about the arts in New York City and the rest of America, written by Terry Teachout. Terry is a critic, biographer, playwright, director, librettist, recovering musician, and inveterate blogger. In addition to theater, he writes here and elsewhere about all of the other arts--books, … [Read More...]

About My Plays and Opera Libretti

Billy and Me, my second play, received its world premiere on December 8, 2017, at Palm Beach Dramaworks in West Palm Beach, Fla. Satchmo at the Waldorf, my first play, closed off Broadway at the Westside Theatre on June 29, 2014, after 18 previews and 136 performances. That production was directed … [Read More...]

About My Podcast

Peter Marks, Elisabeth Vincentelli, and I are the panelists on “Three on the Aisle,” a bimonthly podcast from New York about theater in America. … [Read More...]

About My Books

My latest book is Duke: A Life of Duke Ellington, published in 2013 by Gotham Books in the U.S. and the Robson Press in England and now available in paperback. I have also written biographies of Louis Armstrong, George Balanchine, and H.L. Mencken, as well as a volume of my collected essays called A … [Read More...]

The Long Goodbye

To read all three installments of "The Long Goodbye," a multi-part posting about the experience of watching a parent die, go here. … [Read More...]

Follow Us on TwitterFollow Us on RSSFollow Us on E-mail

@Terryteachout1

Tweets by TerryTeachout1

Archives

February 2018
M T W T F S S
 1234
567891011
12131415161718
19202122232425
262728  
« Jan   Mar »

An ArtsJournal Blog

Recent Posts

  • Snapshot: FDR’s 1933 inauguration
  • Almanac: Ralph Ellison on power
  • Lookback: “Call me Bartleby”
  • Almanac: Thomas Fuller on memory
  • Just because: Arturo Benedetti Michelangeli plays Ravel

Copyright © 2021 · Magazine Pro Theme on Genesis Framework · WordPress · Log in