Hello from Chicago. I've yet to see a man dance with his wife.
Since it's a good bet only three of you at the most saw the Tonys last Sunday you probably missed this acceptance speech by Mark Rylance. It's one of the best ever. I will be voting for this guy for everything from now on.
18 comments :
A quick google reveals that it is a prose poem by a poet from Duluth.
Did you see that article about Rylance in the New Yorker, where he was the artistic director for the Globe (the one in London, not San Diego), and started talking about how Shakespeare's plays were written by someone else?
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Seems the Tonys have quite unusual acceptance speeces in general. This one is cool as well: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wqmW_7BnhYw
Neat speech. Is it just me or did the live announcer call him Mike rather than Mark? No damage to his career since only friends and family watch those things anyway...
Wow. Now THIS iw the way I like to watch the Tonys! Wrylance – or merely dissociative? Frankly Ken, we knew he had you at “baseball cap.”
It was brilliant, as we say across the pond. You are correct, without your post I never would have had the opportunity to enjoy it. I’m guessing 95% of the TV audience mentally tuned out by the last sentence, thought it was an award for theater of the absurd and faked understanding as usual, or just never took English Lit. When you’re an actor, writer, especially a stage actor, it’s comforting to have something tangible to prove you’re a professional, and not just vamping until you find a real job.
"Otherwise it might appear that you have no idea what you are doing, that you are merely wandering the earth, no particular reason for being here, no particular place to go."
Pretty damned wonderful and nice when they remember they're in the entertainment business. Would we rather have had an endless list of producers, family, mentors, and -- in Halle Berry's case -- God?
PS Shakespeare's plays were all written by Dalton Trumbo.
I didn't even know that the Tonys were broadcast until your daughter did her review. I can't help feeling that cheapens them.
I had no idea what the point of his speech was.
Although this acceptance speech was pretty good, his speech (and well, all of them really) at the Theatre World Awards was even better!
I guess it's because they're not televised, but celebrities seem to be more at ease and have much wittier things to say.
Speaking as one of the three people who watched the Tonys (What? I'm going to watch GOLF? The Tonys had people singing and dancing. In the words of Niles Crane, "I can't sleep until I know what person hit what ball through what piece of sports apparatus.") I saw and loved Mr. Rylance's hilariously non-sequitor speech at the time, even though it meant missing somene putting. I only wish he hadn't vitiated it a tiny bit at the end by saying "Thank you." At the risk of employing a sports metaphor, he was great out in left field.
Back in 1983, Mark Rylance became only the second male ever to play PETER PAN on stage in England, for the Royal Shakespeare Company. Imagine, a man in his 30s playing a little boy normally played by a middle-aged woman. Outrageous! He was taking bread out of Jo Anne Worley's mouth! (Where there is plenty of room.)
The only film I've ever seen Rylance in is Angels & Insects. I enjoyed his understated performance in that, but not as much as I enjoyed this speech. Thanks for sharing.
Loved it. It was like Andy Kaufman reading The Great Gatsby. You keep thinking he's going to come out of it and play the role of the overwhelmed winner with a list of 100 people to thank, but he stays on target all the way. Beautiful, it also reminds me of Peter Sellers in Being There. If you go to the woods, it's a good idea to wear orange.
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Actually, I'm still trying to understand the success of Rylance's play. BOEING-BOEING was a flop in its original Broadway production, and until now only slightly better known as a movie with Tony Curtis and Jerry Lewis (playing Rylance's role).
It's just that European sex farce hasn't done well in the States--even the textbook work NO SEX PLEASE, WE'RE BRITISH only ran a month in New York (compared to nearly two decades in London's West End). In fact, I was surprised when the play NOISES OFF became a smash here in the 1980's. I would have thought Americans wouldn't appreciate or even comprehend it--the front and backstage goings on of a low-rent English theater company performing one of these type of plays--since they had little exposure to that type of theater and what was unique to it.
great crowd reaction shot from his co-star/my old college friend Mary McCormack...
I was one of the three that saw the speech that night. It was probably the highlight of the evening's speeches for me. I was glad they didn't "play him off".
Say what?
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