Word: wits
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Dates: during 1950-1959
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...satisfying myth. A girl is left upon her wiles. Remembering the admonition of "that loveable old cynic" Dorothy Parker about "girls who wear glasses," many a Cliffedweller foregoes the wisdom of Portia to remain an unlearned, loveable Juliet. Happily, the star of Rosalind, who succeeded in combining both wit and grace, seems to be in its ascendancy over Garden Street...
...reality (e.g., romantic yearnings for the moon with realistic cultivation of gardens) by its doubling back on itself and by its gay, vigilant irony. Through the inspector, Giraudoux pokes merciless fun at literal-mindedness, practical wisdom, bureaucratic palaver. Yet he knows, and expresses with the sad sparkle of his wit, that man needs feet even more than wings, and must accept reality to survive. But there is yet another turn of the wheel: man need neither flee reality nor accept it; he can deliberately transform, it, as the girl's young suitor does, squeezing undreamed-of poetry...
...dialogue is amusing. Especially amusing are the lines spoken by Kurt Kaszuar, as the drinking uncle, and Edgar Steldi as Grandpere. Both are splendid actors, particularly Mr. Kaszuar, who made the evening for me with his Oblomov-like characterization. The French actor, Clande Dauphin, plays Papa with warmth and wit...
...experienced moviegoers may accept Tyrone Power as a dashing example of Renaissance Man. But Wanda Hendrix, ludicrously miscast as an Italian noblewoman, looks like a bobby-soxer lost in an art museum. As her guardian-husband, Aylmer is still playing Polonius with all the sententiousness and none of the wit. Welles, in his own freehand style, out-borgias Borgia. Even as capable an actor as Everett Sloane plays a scoundrel to excess...
...signed to a five-year contract with RCA Victor (Sealtest is a co-sponsor), Chicago-born Bachelor Tillstrom is no more able than his fans to explain exactly why his show clicks. "I don't try to be a satirist, because I am not a brilliant wit like Fred Allen,"* he says. "In fact, I think I tend a little to sadness...