Long Day's Journey Into Night

Having once played Edmund Tyrone myself in summer stock back in 1976, and coming from an Irish-American family, I tend to be a tough critic of productions of this play. For my money, however, this is the most nuanced, well-acted production of LDJIN available. Lemmon perfectly embodies the combination of grandiosity and pettiness that comprise James Tyrone, Sr. Peter Gallagher is a finely poetic Edmund, and Kevin Spacey's Jamie is the most scalding portrait of self-loathing I have ever seen.

The linchpin of the story, for being everybody's scapegoat, is of course Mary Tyrone, and Bethel Leslie's performance is the bedrock and great surprise of this production. Her Mary is less affected and more internal than that of the lacier Katharine Hepburn, who to me always seemed to have one eye on the camera. Having grown up with a real M.T. in my own extended family, I can state from experience that Miss Leslie's "fogbound" portrayal is vastly more authentic, and, to me at least, the more heartbreaking for it.

A superb production all around.

Where were the Emmys? Out to lunch? Obviously, for their shameful, almost criminal lack of nominations for three of these actors.

Gallagher and Spacey are beyond brilliant- young, vital, totally in character, superb is a word that is not good enough.

Leslie is visually a combo of Judi Dench (God, wouldn't one die for a Mary Tyrone from her!) and Hepburn, but she makes the part her own. Another brilliant performance.

The only fly in the ointment is Lemmon - his performance is full of Lemmon-ses! Stock vocal and physical posturing that has become his trademark acting ability. He is abominably bad. Unlike the others, he doesn't even try to become Tyrone, he just filters the character through his stock mannerisms. Shame on him.

Still, you must see this for the brilliance of the other three actors.

'A Long Day's Journey into Night' (1987)

Opening thoughts: Eugene O'Neill's (one of America's finest playwrights, up there with Tennessee Williams and Arthur Miller) 'Long Day's Journey into Night' is a hugely powerful work and one of the greats of the 20th century. Being indeed masterful in character writing and character development and the emotion that pulsates throughout is intense and moving. The first act though may test the patience of first time viewers, with its deliberate pace and heavier emphasis on character and words than plot.

The two best known names are Jack Lemmon, a very amiable actor who was often typecast but did the type of role incredibly well but here as against type as one can get, and Kevin Spacey, hate him as a person but he is/was a heck of an actor. Along with my love of the play and wanting to see as many productions/adaptations as possible, they were my main reasons for seeing this version. While not one of the best, it is still very well crafted and powerful.

Bad things: Limitations do show in the photography and settings, which do an under-budgeted and disorganised feel.

The photography also looking a bit too static and filmed play-like.

Good things: It however is incredibly well acted. The best performances coming from a truly devastatingly moving Bethyl Leslie as the most richly drawn character of the play and from Spacey in a masterclass of searingly intense self-loathing. Peter Gallagher is also moving. Lemmon doesn't quite embody his patriarchal role in the same way as the others do, but he does an admirable job playing against type and is very commanding. The chemistry smolders between the four, Lemmon and Leslie and Lemmon and Spacey particularly so.

O'Neill's writing is hugely intelligent, thought-provoking and complex in the way the characters are written and interact. It is very heavy in talk, and it is very uncompromising talk, but it's the kind that is always crucial to every character, their actions, way of thinking and motivations.

Moreover, the production is deliberately paced, but actually never felt dull to me (even the early portions), in fact for me it flew by. It also has a big emotional impact, especially with Mary and how harrowingly she declines, both in a searingly intense and tear-inducingly moving way which makes it not an easy watch. The direction throughout is sympathetic and intelligent. The characters still are psychologically fascinating, as usual with O'Neill, they have been criticised for being unlikeable but to me they have always come over as very realistic (like the subject matter itself, so much so it hit home with me). While they have their flaws, then again most characters in most films do, they are so powerfully and intricately written that it was hard not to relate.

Closing thoughts: Concluding, not perfect with visual limitations and some static-ness but very impressive everywhere else.

8/10.

Although the camerawork and credits are almost painfully simple, the play itself and the acting make it an amazing experience. At almost 3 hours long, it at first seems a bit daunting, but when the final line is spoken, you can't help but feel cheated out of just a little bit more. I had to see this because I had just seen Kevin Spacey on Broadway in the Iceman Cometh, and, though that was the more powerful experience, I remain sure that this production was as close to perfect as it could be, considering it was not seen live. That it is not live is a problem, because there are moments that clearly expect an audience reaction, but having a live audience videotaped would have detracted greatly, so I am completely satisfied with this method. All of the actors, with the possible exception of Cathleen, who is by far the most minor character with the least screen time, were perfect, and I would take the time to say my favorites, except that that would comprise of listing every actor in the play/movie. The direction starts off somewhat irritating and looks clearly made-for-TV, but by a few minutes into it, this seems completely irrelevant. The introductory credits are white typed on black with absolutely no sound, which is slightly disconcerting considering there are no previews or anything before the start of the play to hint ahead of time, but during the end credits, the magic of this silence is greatly appreciated. An extremely simple production, with only the one set used on stage, this was infinitely more satisfying and powerful than I ever would have imagined from my video rental guy's comment that I must want to torture myself by watching it all in one night. Looking back, I can't imagine a place where I would have been willing to pause it even long enough to answer the phone. I give it a ten out of ten.

This is a film of the 1986 Broadway production of the play. The unusual thing about this production is the use of overlapping dialog -- the actors intentionally step on each other's lines. This gives the effect that none of the characters is listening to any of the other characters. It is disorienting, but it is also true to life. Humans rarely communicate. They just talk at each other, not with each other. The results are the tragedy that we see in the play -- people reduced to ghosts lost in the fog and in the night.