FILM REVIEW
Stage Beauty
Director: Richard Eyre
Cast: Billy Crudup, Claire Danes, Rupert Everett, Ben
Chaplin
Classification: 13SL
Running Time: 109 minutes
Opens On: 14 Jan 2005
It's the 1660s, and Edward 'Ned' Kynaston is England's most celebrated
leading lady. Women are forbidden to appear on stage and Ned profits,
using his beauty and skill to make the great female roles his own. But
King Charles II is tired of seeing the same old performers in the same old
tragedies. Since no one will take him up on his suggestion to improve
'Othello' with a couple of good jokes, he decides to liven the royal
palate by allowing real women to tread the boards. In a slightly less
progressive spirit, he rules that men may no longer play women's parts.
This is good news for the monarch's mistress, the saucy, stage-struck Nell
Gwyn. It is also good news for Maria, Kynaston's lovelorn young dresser
who has been secretly performing at a seedy tavern in lavish costumes
borrowed from her employer. It is very bad news for Ned who plummets from
his exalted position as one of London's most desirable females to become a
virtual nobody, virtually overnight. Cast out of the spotlight, Ned seems
headed for burlesque obscurity until Maria, now a rising star, takes it
upon herself to make a man of him again.
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