The Daily Herald from Provo, Utah • 32

Page C12 THE HERALD, Provo, Utah, Thursday, October 19, 1989 tfeffimasi as Soloed Msngjs 'Merchant to iBroadway seeker after the truth but per- Award for "Rain Man," in a play that marked both his British and his Shakespearean stage debut Hoffman, who grew a beard for the show and shaved it off after the last performance, eschewed above-the-title billing and appeared half way down the cast list. But despite such modesty, the mixed reviews and a top ticket price of 17.50 pounds expensive by London standards, the play quickly sold out. Only the London mega-musicals such as "Phantom of the Opera" and "Aspects of Love" sold as many tickets. The play starts New York performances Dec. 4 at the 46th St.

co-star Geraldine James, was "very rushed." "Dustin hit his peak in the middle of the run," she said in an interview. "He hadn't got the confidence at the beginning and I think he might have gone too much the other way (towards the end), playing too much into the audience." She said she found his attitude anything but starry. "He was so generous, spiritually and literally; he wouldn't have his name over the title and insisted on me having the last curtain call." Julia Wilson-Dickson, the production's dialogue coach, admired Hoffman as "a fanatical worker, a both; he's a man." The Shylock character traditionally provokes the accusation that Shakespeare was anti-Semitic, and anyone involved in staging "The Merchant of Venice" knows how sensitively it must be handled. "To have a Jewish actor play Shylock is mandatory in our age," said Hall. "If you're going to talk about Jewishness, you'd better do it from a position of integrity, and knowledge, not ham acting." Some of the play's success may have been due to renewed enthusiasm for Shakespeare.

But the real draw undoubtedly was Hoffman, fresh from his second Academy Theater, with an opening on Dec. 19. Hall recalled that Hoffman first thought of playing Hamlet, but was judged too old at 52. Malvolio in "Twelfth Night," another possibility, was shelved for want of a suitable Viola. The two then hit on Shylock, one of Shakespeare's most controversial parts and also surprisingly small in light of its importance.

Shylock appears in only five scenes. A planned out-of-town tryout in Bath was canceled because of Hoffman's father's illness, and Hoffman's performance had to evolve during the run. The opening, said enmusiasm man most snusn ai tors. I It fell to her to turn his "dawg" into "dog," and "bawnd" into "bond," and his performance over time got "simpler, more straightforward, and physically stronger vocally," she said in an interview. "The actual conception of it is exactly the same, but the practical delivery has been honed greatly." Could Hoffman tackle other Shakespeare parts? "Absolutely," Wilson-Dickson said.

"I've told him so about 50 times and he's i definitely humble enough to ask." 7 nn a FO YOilR SHOPPING CONVBNIENCI srsn By MATT WOLF Associated Press Writer LONDON (AP) Dustin Hoffman's Shylock on the London stage is now a memory, leaving a legacy of mixed reviews, packed houses and great expectations for Broadway, where he opens in December. Sir Peter Hall's production of Shakespeare's "The Merchant of Venice" was the lone smash hit in an otherwise lackluster summer for British drama. It opened June 1 at the Phoenix Theater for a 13-week run that was extended through Sept. 23. Hoffman as Shylock was a risky venture.

It wasn't just a question of ironing the New York inflections out of Hoffman's voice, but of how the fastidious British theater-going public would take to a Hollywood star attempting Shakespeare. "I didn't quite know what it would be like. All I knew is I would learn something," Hoffman said. Explaining the mixed reviews, he blamed the speed with which the production was rushed onto the stage, due to his father's illness, which forced him to spend time at his bedside in the United States. "We opened in this play after 10 public performances, and my performance for me was like those incisions you see from people who've been operated on," he said in an August interview.

"You still see their fresh wounds and their stitches; now I'm at a point where you can barely see the scars." Shylock is the Jewish moneylender whose thirst for revenge against Antonio (Leigh Lawson), the Venetian merchant of the title, finds its match in the exactingly legalistic heiress, Portia (Geraldine James). Hall, who directed the play, said that as an authentically Jewish actor, Hoffman "changed the part historically." "'Merchant' seemed to me particularly right for him," Hall said in an interview. "Shylock is about the outsider, the man coming into the society which he is foreign to, which was very much Dustin's situation coming into an English theater company." Assessing Hoffman's achievement toward the end of the London run, Hall said: "Shylock is wheeling and dealing and surviving, and mat's what Dustin seizes hold of. To me, he answers the question, is Shylock omic or tragic, by saying he's Mil 8,6 Get 2 In Santa Bucks i 30 INCH ELECTRIC 1 With Each $25.00 Pur 30 "GAS RANGE WITH -7 mmmm i ilk viiS 7v RANGE WITH POPULAR FEATURES MODEL 35FA7 COOKTOP chase Only At Granite Furniture. Then Spend Them On Any Item You May Want At A Special Sale December 6th 7th.

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