The Season: A Candid Look at Broadway by William Goldman

Author:William Goldman [Goldman, William]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2012-12-21T07:54:00+00:00

Any Broadway show may be said to fall into three phases:

i. The preparation of the script

2. Casting

g. Rehearsal and performance

Keep It in the Family, one of the plays mentioned in the chapter on Murphy’s Law, was probably destroyed during the first phase, the script preparation. Dr. Cook’s Garden and Song of the Grasshopper both expired in the last phase-rehearsal and performance-when communications broke down between the various creative personnel. Which one of the three phases is the most important is a matter of opinion only. But this much can be said: more shows die because of miscasting than for any other single reason.

How do you go about casting a play? If a producer is looking for a star, he generally sends the script to the star’s agent, who may or may not send the script on to the star, who will undoubtedly reject it. No one ever gets the star he really wants for a play. Don’t think for a minute they wanted Streisand for Funny Girl or hanning for Dolly! or Harrison for My Fair Lady.

Generally, what you cast for is a quality. You decide what the specific quality most basic to the part is, and then try and find an actor who possesses it. But a problem arises: What is basic? Is a character the charming man who enters in Act I or the sadistic wife-killer he turns out to be just before the final curtain?

Whom would you cast in a light comedy about a successful Long Island financier? Cary Grant? Done and done. Now, whom would you cast in a detective story about a poor, tough, bitter private eye? Bogart. Easy. What if they switch roles? Would you believe Cary Grant as a poor, tough, bitter private eye? You would? You’re crazy. How about Bogart in that comedy about the money man? No chance, right? Wrong. He played it, and wonderfully, in “Sabrina.”

Meaning that Bogart is a better actor than Grant? Not remotely. If it means anything, it’s just that Bogart’s quality is capable of encompassing a wider range of roles. Cary Grant, as he exists today, simply cannot hide the basic quality of being a wealthy, sophisticated, successful man. (He may not be any of those things in real life, but the quality that comes across on the screen insists that he is, and it is that quality you cast for.) Grant can tell us he’s a poor dumb slob; he can swear it a thousand times over, but we’ll just never believe him. Grant doesn’t have to play comedy; his quality works in a thriller just as well, as anyone who saw the brilliant job he did, say, in “North by Northwest” will recall. But the successful intelligent man of the world must be incorporated into his role or the piece will end in failure.

The Promise ended in failure on Broadway. In London it had been well received and had run almost a year. The nicest thing the critics generally said of it here was that it was “worthwhile”-a fatal word-and The Promise expired in less than three weeks.

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