What year what that released? I remember sitting through a 3 hour Indian (sans Indians) Epic before I moved here in 1988... It was ponderous, with very stilted acting. Lots of glitz, great costumes.....
Never mind, I just checked the link... 1989, so it wasn't the one I saw. But I might be willing to try it....
A couple things: The stage version from which the two film versions are taken is nine hours long.
The film has French producers, yes, but the playwright/director who staged the orignal theatrical presentation in Avignon and off-Broadway is British (Peter Brook, of Marat/Sade fame, whose theater company is pretty willfully multiethnic). The production uses the people who were working with the company at the time (and, for the record, Erika Alexander, whose first major television exposure was as cousin Pam on The Cosby Show is African-American). There were Indian intellectuals who took issue with Brook over the adaptation, but not really with the racially non-specific casting.
When the DVD first came out, I remember being disappointed that it was only three hours long, since I had taped the five-hour version from PBS when it first aired. Yes, the viewing is slow going; I think it took me three attempts to clear the first hour. I was confused by the subtleties of Brook's cross-casting, because I would always miss the costuming changes
( ... )
Comments 3
Never mind, I just checked the link... 1989, so it wasn't the one I saw. But I might be willing to try it....
Reply
A couple things:
The stage version from which the two film versions are taken is nine hours long.
The film has French producers, yes, but the playwright/director who staged the orignal theatrical presentation in Avignon and off-Broadway is British (Peter Brook, of Marat/Sade fame, whose theater company is pretty willfully multiethnic). The production uses the people who were working with the company at the time (and, for the record, Erika Alexander, whose first major television exposure was as cousin Pam on The Cosby Show is African-American). There were Indian intellectuals who took issue with Brook over the adaptation, but not really with the racially non-specific casting.
When the DVD first came out, I remember being disappointed that it was only three hours long, since I had taped the five-hour version from PBS when it first aired. Yes, the viewing is slow going; I think it took me three attempts to clear the first hour. I was confused by the subtleties of Brook's cross-casting, because I would always miss the costuming changes ( ... )
Reply
Reply
Leave a comment