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The Theater: New Play in Manhattan
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Candidate
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| Contributor | Craverguy |
| Last Edited | Craverguy Sep 25, 2009 11:42pm |
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| Category | Review |
| Media | Weekly News Magazine - TIME Magazine |
| News Date | Monday, February 18, 1957 06:00:00 PM UTC0:0 |
| Description | Visit to a Small Planet (by Gore Vidal) attracted considerable attention as a satirical TV yarn about a man from a distant and civilized planet who. via flying saucer, visits his "hobby," the Earth. It later aroused considerable speculation as to how, without being sadly watered down, a good saucerful of TV fun could fill a regulation soup bowl of a play. The problem has been solved, on the whole quite happily, by not turning Visit to a Small Planet into a play. It has been turned, instead, into a kind of vaudeville show, with two expert comedians, Cyril Ritchard and Eddie Mayehoff, handling the routines.
Visit does have a genuine and very pleasant first act. The visitor arrives in 1957 from afar, his timing a little askew: he had hoped (and dressed) for the Civil War. Under the surveillance of a general from the Pentagon, he looks about, comments, inquires, and finding that waging war is still Earth's mightiest talent, is all ready to wage an outsized one himself. After that, though satire still fitfully raises its slightly aching head, Visit introduces just about every known vaudeville and revue routine except xylophone-playing and sawing a woman in half. There is an animal act of a sort. There is a mind-reading act. There is a display of levitation. There is, every so often, a monologuist. There are Imitations of Woodland Sounds and Jungle Noises. There is a musical number, a sort of Songs of Three Wars. Indeed, the minute words fail, Author Vidal perkily rushes in with a new sound effect. When inspiration burns low, he throws another monologue on the fire. |
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