At 3:09--SO agree when he says all great plays should be filmed for preservation!! It continually breaks my heart that there are legendary performances I've read or heard about but never got to experience and never will simply because the production happened before my time (or beyond my financial reach)...
Agree 1000# all great plays should be filmed it is a shame the Lawrence Olivier film of my favorite play August Strindbergs The Dance of Death has never been released on Home Video??!!!
As a stage actor you would think he would know to enunciate, not swallow the words at the end of a sentence and project his voice! One shouldn't have to blare the volume at full blast to hear him!
Alan Bates was far more suited to the role of Vershinin than was Robert Stephens, who was too lacking in charisma and sex appeal for the part. That's not to say that Vershinin is necessarily a sexy and charismatic character, but Masha certainly finds him to be so, and the actor has got to be able to make us see what she sees in him, and I just don't see Stephens doing that. I quite enjoyed Bates' Vershinin.
What a great actor! We miss you.
My Mother and I saw this at the Trak cinema in Melbourne. We were both huge Bates admirers. It was wonderful. I was a teenager at the time.
At 3:09--SO agree when he says all great plays should be filmed for preservation!! It continually breaks my heart that there are legendary performances I've read or heard about but never got to experience and never will simply because the production happened before my time (or beyond my financial reach)...
yes, so much great productions are lost. Merchant of Venice (barbican 1998), The Signalman (Windsor 1999) are just a couple of examples.
3:53 - 5:52 he starts talking about the actual character Vershinin & lives of the three sisters/ the circumstances
Agree 1000# all great plays should be filmed it is a shame the Lawrence Olivier film of my favorite play August Strindbergs The Dance of Death has never been released on Home Video??!!!
It's hard to believe that nine months after this interview, Bates died of cancer.
He looks well in this interview.
Thanks - really wonderful to hear Alan talking about his craft
wow, batesologist ! what a treat ! any Bates is good Bates, at least as far as I'm concerned.
thanks in advance for any more....
wordofgord
He was a handsome man! His bisexuality attracts me to him more. ;)
He was. Smolderingly sexy. Was there any special man, do you know?
As a stage actor you would think he would know to enunciate, not swallow the words at the end of a sentence and project his voice! One shouldn't have to blare the volume at full blast to hear him!
Alan Bates was far more suited to the role of Vershinin than was Robert Stephens, who was too lacking in charisma and sex appeal for the part. That's not to say that Vershinin is necessarily a sexy and charismatic character, but Masha certainly finds him to be so, and the actor has got to be able to make us see what she sees in him, and I just don't see Stephens doing that. I quite enjoyed Bates' Vershinin.