The Buffalo News from Buffalo, New York • 21

B7 Lifestyles Thursday May 23 1991 Inside People in the News B8 Social Sews B9 Entertainment BIO Television B12 a is serious 7 but not too humor close to killing themes By TERRY DORAN News Critic NIAGARA ON THE LAKE Ont A very tine production of "The Doc tor's began the Shaw es tival's summer season Wednesday There are more to come the rest of this week and then some in July and August Once open plays take an irregular schedule through the summer months and into the early fall in the three theaters that make up the festival at Niagara on the Lake Joining Dilemma" this evening is the talk so far of this small theater town rank erot ic tragedy adapt ed by Peter Barnes the Rod gers and Hart musical Con necticut Yan riday No el drama Happy Saturday after noon and a British farce by Ben Travers "A Cuckoo in the Nest" Saturday evening Later oittwill be Ber nard Millionair and his Cuttings" Luigi ry and Henrik "Hedda Ga Doctor's is a fitting beginning because it puts on display exact lythose qualities associated with the best festival theater: it is beautifully designed affti assembled and the ensemble acting is flfst rate Shaw's play opens in medical debate veers over to moral questions bearing on the artist and society ends with a death scene If this sounds serious it is If it sounds too serious it As always sense of comedy comes dangerous to annihilating the gravity of his general themes jThe front of the play is a lot of frivolity aL(he expense of the most successful medical minds (this was written in 1906) They are in earnest conflict over diagno and treatments putting one another down and jumping on the surgeon among thgm and politely disagreeing most of them have been knighted already for one celebrated mis calculation or another Much of what is sat'd could be put in the mouths of doctors today with no loss of meaning Into this friendly conflict is injected a moral dilemma: if only one patient can be gaved is it better to save a talented scoun drel or an honest man of no use to anyone but himself? Medical matters including themiracle treatment called opsonin arc largely factual culled by Shaw from atrend and adversary' in the medical field He was what call technical adviser In the play he goes under the name of £olenso Ridgeon Michael Ball plays him with as much passion as the circum stances allow It happens that not a whole kit is allowed These are the pinnacle of Harley Street types and as such are re trginedly British even exemplars of over Control except when they are jumping on One another about their bread and butter medical specialities So Ridgeon has just been knighted for Opsonin and this confirmed bachelor falls Review THEATER The Dilemma Rating: Bernard Shaw's come dy of morals at risk in the medical profession Directed by Paul Lam pert eaturing Maggie Huculak Robert Ben son Michael Ball Bar ry MacGregor and oth ers Performances continue in repertory through Oct 13 in the estival Theatre Niagara on the Lake Ont See Shaw Page Bll Wk 'f JaJSjk jjttdl lBKB ''BBL vH rjn 1 HMwk Mr WhHKmHHMHBi Susan Sarandon left and Geena Davis are best friends on a weekend getaway in "Thelma The Bird fugitives in the great American tradition By JE SIMON News Critic VERY innocent at first All Thelma and Louise want to do is spend a weekend in the woods fishing All they have in mind is holing up in a cabin drinking too much saying obscene things and bashing the opposite sex a little you know the kind of things guys do all the time So they cut out on Thelma's carpet salesman husband Darryl and boyfriend Jimmy and hit the road in Louise's pow der blue Bird Thelma (Geena Davis) though isn't used to this much freedom It's life's most powerful drug and she overdoses All it takes is one raunchy blues band and a few too many margaritas and she becomes en tangled in the parking lot with a roadhouse rapist too stupid to understand the word (The alleged events in Palm Beach la recently have given this movie an edge no one knew it would have a year ago) Louise (Susan Sarandon) finds them takes a gun out of her purse and blows him away The tone of the movie changes com pletely The two Arkansas travelers lam out and flee from the cops of several states and a bushel of feds Along the way they encoun ter amoral young studs old boy friends and the occasional road REVIEW Thelma Louise Rating: Susan Sarandon and Geena Davis drive from Arkansas to the Grand Canyon in a powder blue Bird Di rected by Ridley Scott Rated opening riday in the Holiday Market Arcade Boulevard and McKin ley Mall theaters side business that can be safely knocked over when their funds fall too low (from the studly young vagabond Thelma learns to reassure her victims that done properly armed robbery have to be an entirely un pleasant The result is Ridley Scott's wonderful buddy film "Thelma a kind of dialectic be tween freedom and desperation in which it turns out that no syn thesis is possible The film is funny jaunty and gorgeous to look at (Scott is the man who directed and a purveyor of singular cinematographic vi sions) It also has a deeply seri ous undercurrent and an extraor dinary ending in which desperation and exhilaration arc somehow in ceric balance It deserve to get lost in the summertime shuffle of ac tion adolescence and asininity but that unfortunately is very much what may happen when it opens riday goes up against in the Memo rial Day weekend film openings Ron (an amalgam of magnificent spe cial effects and muddled puerili ty) and a mega budget comic extravaganza from the team of producer Joel Silver and star Bruce Willis Hard Lord help it Quality may not be enough is in the great American movie tradition of and Easy and its near perfect male equivalent Jerry Schatz berg's starring Gene Hackman and Al Pacino If you want to know how punk and egregious is the movie era living in consider this: If had come out in 1974 it have seemed all that rare It would have been an entertaining and beguiling film about the Ameri can landscape and the roles fran tic people play But in a time of drastically contracted movie ex pectations this sumptuous and lovable road ramble seems as rare and precious and unexpected as a meteorite from Mars To have a major budget road film with female co stars a quirkish script (by first timer Callie Khouri) and a poetic end ing that been snuffed out by a committee of panicky execu See Page Bll Don Paul set to return "I to Channel 4 By ALAN PERGAM ENT 1 News RadioTV Critic is not being renewed Don Paul's Channel 2 contract runs out September DON PAUL IS proving to be an unpre dictable meteorologist Paul who left Channel 4 in a contract dispute in August 1988 and signed with Channel 2 a month later is returning to Channel 4 I In the process successor at Chan nel 4 Ted Textor is being left out in the cold And Paul may get much of the fall and winter off contract which runs to the end of the year said WIVB TV General Manager Gary Nielsen Textor will re main on board until his contract ends contract at Channel 2 runs out in September agree ment with me al lows for him to fulfill his contract obligation to WGRZ said Nielsen expect to see Don Paul on the air on Channel 2 until However Channel 2 might consider taking Paul off the air in the misguided hope that I the public would forget about him before switches stations Paul had been negotiating with WGRZ officials too His current contract has a six month non compete clause that could delay his on air return as a Channel 4 meteorolo gist until March 1992 If Textor doesn't have a new job by then he might be al lowed to stay while WIVB awaits ar rival I Paul's Channel 2 contract may allow him to appear on Channel 4 after Septem ber in a capacity other than meteorologist 4 Nielsen is happy to get Paul back his departure led to a wave of viewer protests and hopes that WGRZ threaten any lawsuits "I have absolutely no desire to repeat what happened in said Nielsen Paul's attorney Glenn Murray said: think there are any grounds to claim that Don has violated his contract at Chan nel 2 in any way and he has no intention of doing Ironically Paul's Channel 2 debut in 1988 was delayed by a few months because of a Channel 4 lawsuit that cited his non compete clause with that station The popular meteorologist left Channel 4 after four years in a contract dispute with former WIVB President and General Man ager Les Aeries and Station Manager John Hayes which ended with Paul saying his agent had pushed too hard in negotiations He unsuccessfully asked for his job back Channel 4 said Paul quit Paul claimed he was fired Paul signed with Channel 2 the week Sharad Tak took over the station Channel 4 then sued Channel 2 Channel 2 and Pau countersued All the suits eventually were dropped people who were responsible for the action taken back then are gone from Channel said Paul have nothing bad to say about Channel 2 or its management It was a very difficult Once Paul came aboard WGRZ the sta tion introduced a segment early in the newscast to draw attention to expertise Channel 4 has since re sponded with its own hourly weather report and promotes itself as the Channel 2's loss of Paul will be a big blow to the third rated news operation in See Pergament Page B12 The rabbi plays for laughs Ex Buffalonian does the comedy club circuit By ANTHONY VIOLANTI News Staff Reporter a HEN RABBI Bob Alper left Temple Beth Ww Zion after six years in Buffalo some members of the congregation seemed de pressed XX" one woman told Rabbi Alper in an exasperated voice is very Rabbi Alper said next rabbi will do a better count on came the sarcastic reply what they said last Rabbi Alper loves to tell that joke and only fitting because comedy just happens to be this shtick He claims to hold a unique position in show ZL business the only practicing clcrgy man doing stand up comedy It's not always easy combining weddings fu nerals and bar mitzvahs with comedy dates but XZ Rabbi Alper manages to do it when I get up on stage people don't know what to expect" he said humor is universal and once they start laughing every one is comfortable" Dr Robert A Alper 46 grew up in Provi dence and came to Temple Beth Zion in 1972 He left for Philadelphia in 1978 and is now a rabbi in East Dorset Vt He recently returned to Buffalo for a sold out comedy performance at the Jewish Center During the 1980s Rabbi Alper began to ex plore the world of comedy clubs life is my said Rabbi Alper who has a lanky stage presence and wry wit looking he says as sort of a cross between Alan Alda and Steve Martin I was a kid I was always saying some thing funny and it is the same for me as a rab Those who knew him in Buffalo agree always had a good sense of humor and he could always make people laugh" said Harriett Lerman Dr Gary Cohen says Rabbi Alper a unique understanding of the dynamics of life even the sad times and somehow is able to com See Alper Page B8 Rabbi Bob Alper performs stand up comedy at the Buffalo Jewish Center UWBM ROBERT KIRKHAMBuffalo News i.