ISN’T IT FANTASTIC

I was horrified when I found out that Kenneth Branagh is directing a live-action version of Cinderella for Disney. He seems far too classy to retell this politically retrograde fable. In a recent interview he explained, gorgeously and somewhat convincingly, “It’s a story with which we all identify. Somehow, the idea of, when life is tough, having things work out, sometimes with a bit of magic … for certain kinds of moments it’s a marvelous thing." For "magic” why don’t we substitute fantasy, or voodoo, or wishful thinking, or pornography? At the heart of the Cinderella story lies a notion that’s a little bit troubling, that a romantic partner will come along and solve all of our problems for us. It’s a fantasy that doesn’t play out too frequently, and, for many, remains persistent.

Then last month I attended an event with Bad Feminist author Roxane Gay. In addition to being an accomplished academic and novelist, she’s a fearsome television critic and live tweeter. She spoke, enthusiastically, about how much she loved shows like Scandal, The Good Wife, and SVU. When asked why she explained, “Without fantasy, we don’t have a lot of hope." She pointed gleefully to some of the more far-fetched elements in Scandal, including the way Kerry Washington’s character works as a political fixer while sleeping with the married president, and can wear a white cape and drink red wine.

If fantasy is necessary for the long slog through adult life, the content of the fantasy we allow ourselves to fall into matters too. A successful professional woman leading a stylish and sexually satisfying life is one fantasy. A young woman waiting to being rescued from poverty and drudgery by a prince is another. Fantasy might be a deeply human need, but it can also mask genuine desire and conflict, and cloud crucial life decisions. There’s truth in what Branagh and Gay say about it, and there’s truth in what Yeats says too. [Here I’m thinking specifically of this poem: Meditations in Time of CIvil War.]

October 13, 2014 by Nalina Moses

MAKE IT LOUDER

Confession: when I bought tickets to see Macbeth at the Armory it was with little interest in the Tragedie of Macbeth, its contemporary retelling, Shakespeare in general, or immersive theater. It was to witness Kenneth Branagh fill the Drill Hall with his voice. I will listen to him perform under just about any circumstances ( bizarre, goofy, politically dubious). His voice gives great pleasure. When he speaks I’m reminded how beautiful English can be, and how expressive male voices can be.

This production gives us a lot of Branagh, who wears his rough red stubble, tartan shawl and leather breeches well. But the sound mix seems to hold his voice lower than that of the other actors. And he rushes through his words, glossing over the language and also the drama. When, at the end, he’s told that Lady Macbeth is gone, he starts right into the famous “Tomorrow tomorrow tomorrow” soliloquy and then, suddenly, the speech, and his grief, are done.

This production doesn’t value language. The play has been squashed to two hours, cutting out chunks of dialogue including “Eye of newt, and toe of frog/Wool of bat, and tongue of dog." The transitions between scenes are brisk, and several other actors also rush through their words. Though they speak clearly it’s too quickly for the sounds, and the meanings, to stick. Without pauses Shakespeare’s language, for someone like me, who has no special literary knowledge, is a finely-wrought and pointless lyric.

One voice breaks through. Richard Coyle, who plays MacDuff, has a clear, direct voice whose rhythms sound authentically Scottish. It’s the voice of a good, strong man; when we hear it we believe that he is a natural soldier and that he himself would make a good king. When MacDuff receives news that his wife and child have been taken he stops in mid-step, and this small rupture expresses grief more fully than even his words do. It’s exciting each time he appears, and moving each time he speaks. Why don’t I feel this way about Macbeth?

Photograph by Stephanie Berger, courtesy of Park Avenue Armory.

June 28, 2014 by Nalina Moses

The richest, most expressive element of the BBC detective series Wallander might be the Scandinavian-modern style sets, which were designed by Anders Olin. They set the scene with precision, and offer deep sensual pleasure. The centerpiece is the police station in Ystad, the small city in southern Sweden where the drama unfolds, which was constructed in its entirety in a studio there. The floor where the homicide detectives work is spacious, with low ceilings and limited views to the outside. The open central space, where they gather, is lined with wood planks and furnished with gently-worn, generic (that is, non-iconic) pieces of Scandinavian modern furniture. Lit dimly, and propped with flurries of paper, stuffed birds, rusting metal desk lamps, and dying potted plants, the room evokes the strangeness and sadness of the work the detectives carry out, and that seeps into their personal lives.

The Wallander sets are a terrific contrast to the Mad Men sets, which fetishize mid-century modern design by recreating pristine, museum-like environments, including Rogers Sterling’s office and Don Draper’s apartment. In those sets every object is gleaming, unused, and bathed in brilliant white light. Compare them to the dark hardwood walls, bare concrete floor, and austere tables and chairs that furnish the Wallander police station, which suggest that these rooms have been around for a while, and that the detectives who work here have been around for a while too. Everything inside it them has a lyrical battered feeling. While open office spaces have become a design cliche, particularly for companies that want to project a socially progressive image, the set for Wallander is not about that at all. These detectives work to unearth secrets, purposefully and painfully. The common room, where everyone’s mutterings and moods spill over into everyone else’s, shows us the tumult.

Image courtesty of Ouno Design

March 01, 2013 by Nalina Moses

I like to draft while listening to the morning talk radio shows hosted by Leonard Lopate and Brian Lehrer on WNYC. The voices of these two men are preternaturally soothing, a perfect antidote to the focused graphic and mathematical thinking that goes into computer drawing. Whomever they’re talking with and whatever they’re talking about, it makes perfect Music For Drafting. There’s only one time when what I heard disrupted my work, and that was when Kenneth Branagh visited Lopate’s show this summer to promote a movie. He delivered all the predictable movie star platitudes, but as he started talking I stopped working. Branagh’s unadorned speaking voice is fine and soft; it carries England and Ireland in it, and sadness and music. It’s stunning.

In the PBS series Wallander, based on the crime novels of Henning Mankell, Branagh plays the titular homicide detective. True to the books, the series is shot on location in Sweden and many minor actors are Scandinavians. But Branagh and the other actors in major roles are British. The star adjusts his voice for the part. He doesn’t put on an accent but he holds something back, and in doing so he silences a large part of himself. Wallander is a laconic personality to begin with, so Branagh spends much of his screen time glowering silently and clenching his jaw. The Swedish locations give the stories an aptly gloomy tone. We see the stunted, spiritless streets, ports and parking lots of Ystad where the killers and killed pass their lives. The look of the perpetually overcast skies is remarkable – like aluminum. But what’s the point of these details if Branagh can’t use his voice fully? Why don’t they set the series in Belfast, or Manchester, and let him speak?

October 12, 2012 by Nalina Moses