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Go with me on this one, girls!!!!!!!!!!! Look at this shot of Lady Gaga--how she is shot, and lit! Now, recall her turn on--was it the Academy Awards--doing a rendition of "The Sound Of Music" so dead on to Julie Andrews I actually thought it was Julie herself??????????
OK!!!!!!!!! Now, combine these two ingredients, and, I swear, I think Lady Gaga would make an interesting addition to the gallery of actresses who have played Fosca in Sondheim's "Passion."
Not my favorite of his works, and, believe me, I am so sorry I missed Judy Kuhn---Oh, my God, JUDY KUHN!!!!!!!!!!--at CSC, when she did it!
Here is the great Judy Kuhn!!!!!!!!!! Now, imagine Lady Gaga!!!!!!!!!!!!
I don't think this is too far off the mark, dolls!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
1 comment:
No no no no! Gaga may LOOK a lot like "Fosca" in that pic (assuming she dyed her hair black), and could perhaps manage the singing, but I doubt she has the acting chops to make this incredibly difficult role work on stage. With a LOT of coaching, she might just about get away with it in a pre-recorded, pre-edited PBS special event telecast, but she'd never handle the daily grind of Broadway in even a limited run. The role is just too damned draining for anyone not a dedicated musical theater diva with a lunatic, daredevil edge.
That "Passion" ever worked at all in the first place is a tribute to the talents of Donna Murphy: the entire thing rested on her shoulders. The original Italian movie is a highly unrealistic Aesop's Fable, using an improbable (to the point of impossible) scenario to make intriguing points about the powers (and failings) of love. That "improbability factor" is a very tough hurdle for the actress playing Fosca: she's an "only in fiction" type of character, a symbolic figure that nonetheless needs to seem genuinely human. Fosca is ugly, pathetic, creepy, repellent, needy, and unpleasant yet by the end of the show needs to somehow make you believe she could persuade the handsome, shallow Giorgio to fall in love with her (in the process of becoming more than a pretty-faced stud-puppet himself).
Very very tricky stuff, which is why half the audience walked out by mid-point the three times I saw the original production. I found the show devastatingly personal: it was quite uncomfortable, yet somehow thrilling, to realize just how much "needy monomaniacal Fosca" I harbor inside me. The audiences that didn't leave, who could grasp what Sondheim was getting at, were enthralled to a degree I've never seen in any other musical. Truly a love/hate piece of art- you either adore it, or absolutely loathe it. There's no middle ground: not even the oft-reviled "Sunday In The Park With George" is so controversial.
Thanks for the heads up on Judy Kuhn, I missed that production. I gather the show was considerably reworked for later revivals, including a one-week-only run with Patti Lupone, Michael Cerveris and Audra McDonald at Lincoln Center. Since I have such affection for the initial concept, I'm not sure how I'd react to a "re-imagining", but at least the Broadway production was released on video by PBS. Guess I can always return to it as a touchstone.
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