Stage Beauty- 1/23/10

Stage Beauty (2004)

Tim
(2.5 stars) - Another movie that came out in 2004, but didn't get nearly the critical acclaim of Million Dollar Baby, and with good reason. Liz and I had only heard about this movie in passing and were very interested in it because we both love Claire Danes and both think that Billy Crudup is a very under-rated actor. Well, in this film neither actor really lived up to my expectations, but it may not have been entirely their faults. Billy Crudup is an actor who makes his living playing female Shakespeare characters at a time when women are not allowed to act on stage. Ned (Billy Crudup) has been training his who life to be able to convincingly act like a woman and everyone talks about his beauty and how feminine he is. The problem was that Billy Crudup is just not that womanly looking so the whole thing looks awkward on the screen. The plot is very contrived in many parts and is hard to fully get a handle on, including the fact that Ned is gay at the beginning, but then sleeps with Maria even though they never seem to like each other very much before then. The sets looked kind of cheap and undetailed; you could definitely tell it was done on a tight budget. All in all it definitely left me wanting more.


Liz
(2 stars) I should have loved this movie... Billy Crudup, Claire Danes, Shakespeare, the life of an actor... What more could I ask for? This just proves that a movie can have some of your favorite actors and be about a subject you are very interested in, but still be terrible. The plot focuses on the time in history when only men were allowed to act and certain male actors were renowned for playing female roles. Billy Crudup plays an actor who is one of the most famous actors who only portrays woman. Claire Danes is his dresser who secretly wants to be an actress herself, and essentially is the one who brings women playing women into fashion. What keeps this movie from working is its total lack of character development. What was Crudup and Danes' relationship like before she starts taking his parts? At one point it seems like they really care for each other, and then at another point, it seems like he never paid much attention to her at all. All in all, it seems like it might have been an interesting concept and an interesting time in theater history, but the story never really comes together and you find yourself not really caring about what happens to the characters.

On a side note- this is the movie where Crudup and Danes become involved with each other, prompting him to leave his pregnant girlfriend, Mary Louise Parker. Scandalous!