Chicago Tribune from Chicago, Illinois • 127

Section 5 Chicago Tribune, Sunday, August 22, 1971 'STATUS QUO VADIS' World Premiere for Ivanhoe ft I 'v 1 i i I 1 1 By William Leonard THE IVANHOE Theater, which some months ago announced a world premiere that did not eventuate, will stage a genuine world premiere this week, with the opening on Thursday of Donald Driver's play, "Status Quo Vadis." Tennessee Williams' "Out Cry," which had been announced originally as a new work, proved to be a rewrite of a play done in London several seasons ago. Driver says of "Status Quo "In theoretical democracy all men are equal. In theoretical democracy there is no class system. Both iwY -ix ft i II i' 'V i 1 1 I- 4 it, Oliver Burns at the Stake and at Film Critics By Carol Kramer NEW YORK Oliver Reed was mad. He had flown to New York with a suitcase full of "battle plans and smart suits," ready to take up the sword on behalf of "The Devils," the Ken Russell film that New York critics had torn apart almost as savagely as Reed was torn apart in the film.

For the sake of Russell, Reed had lain in the rack for four days, had burned at the stake for three days Russell did allow Reed an escape chute, but whenever he used it, Russell would complain and had his tongue stretched Russell wanted to puncture it, but Reed objected to having the source of his actor's livelihood ruined so early in his career, so a rubber tongue was substituted. All this just for one film. In "Women in Love," Russell's first feature film and one that made the name of Oliver Reed well known in this country, Reed had wrestled in the nude and slid down a toboggan chute, fearing for his life. Before that, in Russell's television documentary on the life of Rossetti, Reed had filled his mouth with strawberry jam, suffered a snake to crawl across his face and allowed 24 beetles "to have a tea party in my mouth." What is the worst thing Russell has ever done to you? "Screamed at me because I got a taxicab at an airport before he did." There is a love-hate relationship between the two men, and Reed may scream at Russell on a set. Sample: When Russell screams that Reed has not stayed at the stake long enough, Reed shouts, "It's hot, But, defending Russell's reputation as an artist is entirely different.

Here he was in New York, with his friend Carol Lynley at his side and no one who had written those reviews I Ik jmwmhhim.i mnermnim Theater David Wilson as Horace Elgin has a fiery discussion with his parents, Otto Schlesinger and Geraldine Kay, in this rehearsal scene from "Status Quo Vadis," which will have its world premiere at the Ivanhoe Theater Thursday. Oliver Reed spent three days burning at the stake to film this scene in "The Devils," in which he plays a 17th-century priest accused of witchcraft. does, for a minute, but his battle plans are well laid. Why did Russell show the King of France shooting feathered Huguenots so he could say, "Bye, bye, What was the point of that? "Russell wants to make people conscious that they are watching a film." What about the rumors that extras were raped on the set during the orgies? "There have always been extras who for $15 would call up the press and tell a story. It didn't happen at all." Reed continues, armed with historical facts which Russell sometimes follows in the film and sometimes doesn't.

'When he does, he is adhering to realism. When he doesn't, "He is translating moments of history in language the public "The-Roval Family," Jan. 25 to Feb. 27. "The Ruling Class," a satire by Peter Barnes, will be presented from March 7 to April 8, and the season will conclude, April 18 to May 21, with a new musical by Seale, George Goehring and John Kuns, authors of this season's surprise hit, "Lady Audley's Secret." assumptions are patently absurd.

While the American Dream pursues this naivete a clearly defined strata of classes has evolved in which equality, theoretically horizontal, has become singularly vertical according to birth, intelligence and whatever union you happen to belong to. Equality has become our inalienable right to be equal with the people above us so we need not be equal with the people below. "The gap between classes is ever widening. It has become increasingly more difficult to move freely from one to another because of birth, education, organizations and the impersonality of the machine. This social satire is about a young man, a victim of the system, whose reach falls short of his grasp Horace Elgin, a present day Horatio Alger in reverse." Donald Driver started his theatrical career as a dancer with the Ballet Russe de Monte Carlo, and directed more than 50 musicals before AMUSEMENTS was showing up at an interview.

"I am here to find out what the American press is about in abusing our film," the husky Reed complained, "But they are all hiding away. Everybody I've talked to so far loved the film. Where are the baddies?" Reed was prepared with long speeches from the film, which he occasionally slipped into to illustrate a point. The film, written by Russell, is based on Aldous Huxley's book, "The Devils of Loudun," which described the horrors perpetuated by a group of turning to Shakespeare with the Princeton Repertory Theater and at Stratford, and Washington, D. C.

He directed the Broadway oro-duction of "MaratSaae," wrote and directed the off-Broadway musical, "Your Own Thing," based on Shakespeare's "A Comedy of Errors," and staged "Jimmy and the all-star revival of "Our Town" with Henry Fonda, Ed Begley and Mildred Natwick. David Wilson, 22-year-old actor making his stage debut, was chosen from among more than 60 candidates to star in the role of Horace Elgin. George Keathley, Ivanhoe producer, says he chose Wilson "for his freshness, his superior natural jli 3 lip ill gwyiniimiiwmy 1 Great Series ii talent, his sensitivity to the material, and his astounding physical Tightness for the role." Gail Strickland, who will play the heroine, is making her Ivanhoe debut after an extensive career in off-Broadway shows, summer stock, raaio vid television commercials. Rebecca Taylor has been seen at the Ivanhoe in "Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?" and "Another Part of the Forest," and with the Goodman professional company in half a dozen plays. Goodman Schedule The Goodman has announced its schedule of five plays for the season of 1971-72.

its third professional year. There will be a preseason production of "A Place Without Doors," English version of a French play by Marguerite Duras, author of "Hiroshima Mon Amour." The cast will include Mildred Dunnock, Alvin Epstein and Hiram Sherman, with Brian Murray directing. The play will preview Sept. 21 and run thru Oct. 10.

Goodman's official season will start Oct. 25 with the world premiere of "Assassination, 1865," first playwrit-ing effort of Stuart Vaughan, who was the first artistic director of New York's Phoenix Theater. Oscar Wilde's "The Importance of Being Earnest," Dec. 7 to Jan. 16, will be directed by Douglas Sealc, who also will direct a revival of the Edna Ferbcr and George S.

Kaufman comedy, SEASON 1971-72 Famed Artists in Person understands." Not that Reed is always ready to defend Russell. "I always say I'll never work for him again," he said, after detailing the tortures he endured during the shooting. "But he'll come around and be very charming. He works in a weird and wonderful way, you know. Time heals most wounds." Then he turns to Miss Lynley and asks, "Doesn't it, love? "If Ken comes up with another film, he'll forgive me and I'll forgive him." Then he points out that "Women in Love" would not have been made if "I hadn't accepted the financial terms.

At that time I was more of a name in movies than he was as a director." One big fight during that film was on the subject of the nude wrestling scene between Oliver and Alan Bates. "Ken wanted to shoot that in water. He knows nothing about pugilism," says the ex-boxer. "You can't articulate your body in water. So I picked Ken up and threw him across his kitchen and said, "That's the way it should be But back to "The Devils." Reed complains that one minute and 56 seconds of the film were cut for American audiences.

In other sequences, shots of breasts were substituted for shots of pubic hair. The final agony of Grandier was cut. As it stands, you see his blistered, suffering face. "There was an even more grotesque shot where he is choking and finally burned." One gets the feeling Reed disapproves of the cuts. Why shouldn't Americans see everything? As for children, no.

"I don't think so. We use moments of horror to show grownups that real horrors took "place. "I usually make serious movies," he says, "Except for when I had to make movies for money." The 33-year-old actor, the nephew of the English director, Sir Carol Reed, broke into movies by playing werewolves. priests and politicians in 1634 in France against Father Ur-bain Grandier portrayed by Reed, a free-loving priest guilty of many "immoralities," but not the one for which he is put to the rack and the stake witchcraft. A nun, played by Vanessa Red-.

grave, accuses Grandier of possessing her and the other members of her order in the form of the The story furnished Russell with enough material for 72 orgies. The nuns dance around naked, Vanessa Redgrave writhes in sensual ago 6 for the price of 4 2 performances Free OCT. 6-Michelangeli, Pianist NOV. 5-Ricci, Violinist DEC. 12-Bach Aria Group JAN.

21 -Vienna Opera Co. FEB. 27-Herman Prey, Baritone APR. 8-Minnesota Symphony, Skrowaczewski, Conducting Ken Russell Burt Reynolds, TV's Dan August, will star in "The Tender Trap," opening Tuesday at Arlington Park Theater, thru Sept. 19.

H3M 0 Wa ilk 6 for the price of 4 2 performances Free OCT. 14-Jacques D'Amboise's Ballet Theatre USA NOV. 9-Maurice Beiart's Ballet of the Twentieth Century DEC. 4-Dame Marqot Fonteyn nies, thus giving Russell a chance to photograph the hideous hump on her back, and there are bloody examinations, exorcisms and tortures. The complaints by critics were mostly directed at the spectacle.

Reed was ready to defend the film's intentions, as Well as its alleged excesses. "We never set out to make a pretty Christian film. Charlton Heston has made enough of those. Ken Russell has always been a voyeur, a passionate, loud director. Suddenly, when he takes on the role of translator of a period, people say he is a pornographer.

"The film Is not about theology or politics. It is about a twisted people. If we can convince the public that there were twisted people at this time he begins. His speech has been interspersed with Father Grandier's eloquent replies to his torturers, snide comments about American journalists "We in England are used to talking to journalists with large Circulations. It doesn't impress Finally, Miss Lynley beseeches him to "slow down." He with the Nation, fcallet FEB.

3-City Center rfotrrc Ballet AMUSEMENTS AMUSEMENTS Russell spotted him in a low-budget film, "The Girl Getters," and asked him to play Dante Gabriel Rossetti and Debussy on television. He met Miss Lynley in "The Shuttered Room." One big success was "Oliver," directed by his uncle. Reed played no-good Bill Sykes. What else has his uncle done for him? "Well, whatever talent lies in his corpuscles possibly flows in mine." Chicaao Tribune Praia Service FEB.25-Edward Villela AMUSEMENTS with the Boston Betlw MAR. 5-Arthur Mitchell's 'l Dance Theatre of Harlem I AMUSEMENTS AMUSEMENTS Ic'PV 6 for the price of 4 2 performances Free NOV.

8-Maurice Bejart's Ballet of the Twentieth Century NOV. 20-Center Opera Company of Minneapolis JAN. 22-Matinee, Vienna Opera Company FEB. 10-City Center Joffrey Ballet FEB, 17-Alvin Alley's l5W AMUSEMENTS AMUSEMENTS (I 4-)71 TRianGLe PRODUCTions inc. kjjvj i i.w vf 4 xmi-J iiilnBl i 7w im1lLI JlliMHTJl American Dance Theatre APRIL 21-Netherlands Dance Theatre 4 for the price of 3 One Performance Free OCT.

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