It was great fun to see them again. Most were terrific. Billy Crystal was funny again. Robin Wright still looked Buttercuppy after 37 years. Mandy Patinkin ate up all the scenery even though he was in a little box. (He acted like a caged animal.)
You appreciate William Goldman’s brilliant script even more just hearing the words. There was also a Q&A after that was fun.
I’ve had a few Zoom readings of my plays over the last couple of months (face it, that IS theatre this year) and have always been very happy with the performances but annoyed at the technical glitches.
What I found heartening about THE PRINCESS BRIDE reunion was that they had just as many or more technical glitches than my modest readings. And theirs was very high profile. But there were sound problems. Actors popping on when they weren’t supposed to. I’m sure if the actors rehearsed it for a week and it was pre-recorded and edited together it would have been more polished, but only to a certain degree. Depending on the lighting, background, bandwidth, etc. the actors’ boxes would still vary in quality. Sound levels would still be low or echoey, or distorted in places. Robin Wright held her earbud microphone, Mandy attempted to upstage anyone he was on stage with – and the point is, I still enjoyed it.
So perhaps the people watching my Zoom readings also forgave the hiccups and enjoyed them just the same. I’ll never know for sure because I couldn’t hear any laughter (a big problem when trying to judge the success of a comedy), but I was sitting at the breakfast table watching a laptop and laughing out loud at Billy Crystal and Carol Kane so maybe laughs do come through despite the lack of an audience.
I hope so because like I said, for now this is the only theatre there is.
from By Ken Levine
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