The Gazette from Montreal, Quebec, Canada • 17

ARTS LIFE AI7 THE GAZETTE, MONTREAL, SUNDAY, OCTOBER 20, 2002 Theatre's the main thing 4 TV, MOVIE ROLES ARE EXTRACURRICULAR But Mary-Louise Parker might still be hoping for an invitation onto The Simpsons EVAN HENERSON LOS ANGELES DAILY NEWS The Cadillac of Events. Fleeting offers, with class. would be laughing my butt off at every take. I think she's one of the greatest and most under-appreciated actors that we have." The film version of Proof, currently in development, would star Gwyneth Paltrow, who played Catherine in the play's London premiere. Ever philosophical, Parker points out that she's now on the other end of a high-profile play-to-film casting quirk.

Parker, and not Oscar-winner Marcia Gay Harden (who played the role on Broadway), will be playing Harper Pitt in Mike Nichols's star-studded HBO version of Tony Kushner's Angels in America. "I have never taken a play in my life thinking it would be made into a movie," she says. "I do a play because I'm a theatre actress. It's never been very good for my movie career to do that, but that never really mattered to me. The next stage role she takes looking for it will mean that women's rights lobbyist Amy Gardner won't be seen around the West Wing.

Parker says she would like to stay with The West Wing and do as many episodes as possible, but she doesn't want to spend too much time in L.A. "I could have been a regular character," says Parker, whose boyfriend is actor Billy Crudup. "But I like to be at home. The theatre is there, and if there's a play I want to do, I want to be able to doit." "People have been encouraging me to do a TV show for a long time, and I never really wanted to," she continues. "I told my manager that The West Wing was the only show I would be inclined to do, except maybe The Simpsons, and nobody has ever offered me The Simpsons." Amy Gardner was originally going to be a one-shot appearance, a feminist who has "some kind of relationship with the first lady." Then producers kept asking Parker back, eventually having her character tangle with and ultimately romance -deputy chief of staff Josh Lyman (played by Bradley OK, so Mary-Louise Parker doesn't much like TV, as a viewer or participant, and she positively detests "boo!" movies.

"I don't want to pay somebody to scare me," the South Carolina-born actress says. Which raises a couple of questions: What, then, is she doing racking up mucho screen time -and a recent Emmy nomination on NBC's The West Wing? And for that matter, what in the name of fava beans and Chi-anti is a horror-hater doing in "This is a big movie, and apparently it behooves one to be in a big movie now and again," says Parker. "The director was really nice and enthusiastic, a really sweet guy, and that's infectious. The movie is what it is." Parker plays Molly Graham, wife of FBI special agent Will Graham (played by Edward Norton) and a potential target of menace for serial killer Francis Dolarhyde (Ralph Fiennes). The actress saw Anthony Hopkins's first turn as Lecter in The Silence of the Lambs, but she doesn't exactly call herself a fan of author, Thomas Harris's Lecter trilogy "One of my best friends, Brooke Smith, was in (Silence) -she was-the girl in the pit," says Parker, 38.

"I never would have seen it otherwise. I couldn't sleep after I saw it. I don't like those kinds of movies at all." Parker's breakout film role was in Norman Rene's AIDS drama Longtime Companion in 1990, which was followed by a turn in the ensemble of Lawrence Kasdan's Grand Canyon. A convincing on-screen sufferer, Parker had lingering death scenes in Fried Green Tomatoes and Boyp on the Side. On where she works most prominently, Parker is any- thing but anonymous.

Ever on FROM GAZETTE FILES Mary-Louise Parker is expanding her repertoire of roles. the lookout for roles in new plays, Parker originated roles in Paula Vogel's How I Learned to Drive and Craig Lucas's Prelude to a Kiss. A flush of notice came following her Tony award-winning work in David Auburn's Proof, which she acted in for nearly a year. As Catherine, the battle-scarred daughter of a mathematical genius, Parker swept every New York acting honour. It was the must-see performance in the 2000-01 's season's must-see play Writerdirector John C.

Walsh not only saw that performance, he cast Parker in the low-budget Romantic comedy Pipe Dream. In the film, which opened in limited release this weekend, Parker plays an industrial film producer who has to help a plumber (played by Martin Donovan) im- personate a film director. Since Parker shot Pipe Dream while simultaneously doing eight performances a week of Proof, the actress's availability was stretched almost to the breaking point. But Walsh still feels he got more than his money's worth. "Her preparation was phenomenal," Walsh says.

"Some people have discipline but not talent. With Mary-Louise, I 2002 Cadillac Escalade -( Starting from $62,998 ON PURCHASE L-L-rv 'if "I tr "A i I4 if AX 7 4 If TV Jr- 'A 'A 'MM 1 trj if V-, i i I i 1 The most powerful sport utility vehicle in the world. I 1QUIZ ANSWERS ARTHUR KAPTAINIS Alexandria's lost libraries held about 700,000 items 2002 Cadillac DeVRU'T; 1 ON PURCHASEL-- James Lenox and the Tilden Trust. There are vast holdings in various branches, although the tourist is more likely to marvel at the magnificent public rooms (with extensive murals) than do any reading. 6 The Codex Atlanticus is a richly illustrated sketchbook of Leonardo da Vinci, whose portrait of the musician Gaffurio is included in the art holdings of this former palace (1609) of Cardinal Federico Borromeo.

Note also the Raphael cartoon for The School of Athens. The Ambrosian is notable for being one of the first libraries in Europe to go public. 7 The full name would have been helpful: The Fol-ger Shakespeare Library. Henry Clay Folger (1857-1930) was the chairman of Standard Oil of New York but his passion from youth was for the Bard. Folger started collecting in 1889 with an auction purchase of a Fourth Folio of Shakespeare's works, and never looked back.

His schoolteacher wife, Emily Jordan, was an enthusiastic co-collector. The art deco building, opened in 1932, includes a theatre along with 75,000 books, manuscripts and engravings. 8 The Pierpont Morgan Library at Madison Ave. and 36th St is valuable not only as a repository of rare books (including the mandatory Gutenberg Bible) but as a relic of the Gilded Age. J.E Morgan's dark and quiet study is maintained in its original condition.

The library has got with it and installed pleasant gift shop and cafe. Absolute luxury incarnation. Cadillac Privileges Cadillac warranty with no-charge scheduled maintenance for 4 years or 80.000 km. In N.Y., Patience and Fortitude guard portals that lead to learning Answers to quiz on Page A15 IThis is the year when Theophilus, bishop of Alexandria, acted on the orders of Emperor Theodosius I and ordered the razing of pagan temples, among which were the two greatest libraries in the world, one kept in a temple of Zeus and the other in a museum. The Alexandria collections at their maximum were said to contain, counting duplicates, about 700,000 rolls.

Arabs finished the job a few centuries later, reasoning that the Koran held all necessary written truths. A new library in Alexandria was opened this week. 2 The world's largest library is the Library of Congress in Washington, D.C., restarted (after a fire) in 1814 with Thomas Jefferson's personal collection and now holding more than 90 million volumes in more than 900 kilometres of shelves. Its preeminence was guaranteed in 1870 by the Copyright Act, which required all copyrighted material to be deposited in the library The Beaux-Arts main building, resembling the Paris Opera (with a vast Great Hall within), opened in 1897. The Library of Congress also holds a collection of Stradivarius instruments to match its music manuscripts.

3 The oldest public library in Europe is the Vatican Library, found in the 4th century, although restarted in earnest in the 15th century by Pope Nicholas It contains more than 1 million volumes, but manuscripts constitute the part of the collection that matters. American librarians did the modern chore of cataloguing in the late 1920s. Manuscripts can be viewed on microfilm at St. Louis University in Missouri. 4 All these writers used the huge domed 1857 Reading Room of the British Museum, aka the British Library, which has been administratively distinct from the museum since 1973.

Marx spent countless hours here absorbing data; his desk is a left-wing tourist attraction. Among the British Library manuscript holdings are Beowulf, the Magna Carta, the 4th-century Greek Bible known as the Codex Sinaiticus, Froissart's Chronicles, and a papyrus of Aristotle. 5 Matching marble lions known as Patience and Fortitude are the symbols of the New "jork Public Librar a building opened in 1911 aI created from the bequests of John Jacob AstoJ, Deoen Your Quebec Coditlac Dealers' AssoriatiM el Quebec recommends ceRsemen read the foDowiM WonMtie. limited time retail offers applying mmm Poetry Lunch Reading Series Rare Books and Special Collections Division, McGill University Libraries MARYDALTON Will read from her work on October 25, 2002 At 12:30 pm Lande Reading Room McLennan Library Bldg. 4th Floor 3459 McTavish St.

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