With ‘Rustin,’ George C. Wolfe is latest in line of Broadway directors to go Hollywood
George C. Wolfe has been a theatrical titan for three decades earning his first Tony nomination as writer and director of the 1992 musical “Jelly’s Last Jam.” Wolfe, 69, won his first Tony the following year for directing part I of Tony Kushner’s landmark AIDs drama “Angels in America: Millennium Approaches.” Not only has he earned two more Tonys, he was artistic director and producer from 1993-2004 at the New York Shakespeare Festival/Public Theater. Though he continued to direct plays, Wolfe decided in 2004 to concentrate on film and TV work receiving the DGA Award and an Emmy nomination for directing the 2005 drama “Lackawanna Blues.”
Three years ago, he directed the lauded Netflix adaptation of August Wilson’s “Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom” for which Viola Davis and the late Chadwick Boseman earned Oscar nominations. Though he didn’t receive a nomination for direction, Wolfe brought a dynamism, passion and an innate ability to bring out the best in his actors. And he brings those same qualities to his latest Netflix project, “Rustin,” which shines the spotlight on gay civil rights activist Bayard Rustin (Colman Domingo) who worked with Martin Luther King and others to organize the March on Washington 20 years ago. Domingo’s vibrant performance is a leading candidate for an Oscar nomination.
The New York Times wrote: “Every so often an actor so dominates a movie that its success largely hinges on his every word and gesture. That’s the cast with Colman Domingo’s galvanic title performance in ‘Rustin,’ which runs like a current through this portrait of the gay civil-rights activist ….”
Over the decades, many award-winning theater directors have equaled their success on the big screen including Elia Kazan, Mike Nichols, Peter Hall, Sam Mendes and Rob Marshall. But a lot of theatrical directors learned going Hollywood isn’t that easy.
Harold Prince was literally Broadway royalty who won a slew of Tonys as producer and director of such landmark musicals “Cabaret”; Stephen Sondheim’s “Company,” “Follies,” “A Little Night Music,” “Candide,” and “Sweeney Todd,” as well as Andrew Lloyd Webber’s “Evita” and “The Phantom of the Opera.” He made his feature directorial debut with the R-rated 1970 black comedy “Something for Everyone” with Angela Lansbury and Michael York. Though it didn’t burn up the box office, it did receive some decent reviews though the Village Voice thought it was a “total disaster” putting the blame on Prince.
Seven years later, he directed the film adaptation of “A Little Night Music,” which did earn Jonathan Tunick an Oscar for best music, original song score and its adaptation or best adaptation score. Elizabeth Taylor and Diana Rigg as well as several actors from the Broadway show including Len Cariou, Hermione Gingold and Laurence Guittard starred. The film divided critics. Stephen Farber loved the movie especially Rigg’s performance –she is the best thing about the film — but generally critics and audiences weren’t overjoyed. Wrote the New York Times:
“’A Little Night Music,’ the Broadway musical adaptation of the Bergman film, directed by Harold Prince, with music and lyrics by Stephen Sondheim at his best, sent one out of the theater feeling in the top form. It’s something more than a shock, then, that the film adaptation of the Broadway show not only fails to raise the spirit, it also tramples on them. The more kindly disposed will leave the theater depressed, a lot of others may be in rage.” Prince, though, didn’t miss beat and did some of his best Broadway outs including “Sweeney Todd” and “The Phantom of the Opera” which is now the longest running Broadway show closing earlier this year after 13,981 performances.
Jose Quintero was considered the foremost interpreter of Eugene O’Neill’s plays including his landmark 1956 off-Broadway production of “The Iceman Cometh,” which starred a young Jason Robards. And in 1957, he earned a Tony nomination for directing O’Neill’s “Long Day’s Journey into Night,” also starring Robards. He won his first Tony for directing the best play and Fredric March won lead actor. He finally won a Tony in 1974 for best director for the well-received revival of O’Neill’s “A Moon for the Misbegotten” with Robards and Colleen Dewhurst.
Quintero was also known for his staging of Tennessee Williams’ works such of his 1952 off-Broadway production of “Summer and Smoke” starring a young Geraldine Page. And in 1961, he directed his only feature film, “The Roman Spring of Mrs. Stone” based on a Williams novel. Vivien Leigh in her penultimate movie as a famous actress who has an affair with a gigolo (Warren Beatty). The famed Lotte Lenya received an Oscar nomination as a manipulative Contessa. The New York Times wasn’t impressed: “The picture is little more than a documentary of moods-moods based on a supposition of weak confusions and trashy desires.” No wonder he returned to the theater.
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