With the increasing importance of performance based criticism, today's academics are taking stage, film and television productions of Shakespeare's plays far more seriously. To this end, I welcome the home video release of Shakespeare's Women and Claire Bloom (1999) by First Run Features. This documentary, directed and edited by Phillip Schopper and produced by Julian Schlossberg and Seymour Wishman, presents a delightful look at Shakespeare's heroines from the perspective of veteran actor Claire Bloom, whose career spans several decades.
Bloom, who has been performing Shakespeare at Stratford since age seventeen, has previously delivered one-woman live monologues dramatizing important speeches of Shakespeare's great female figures - Juliet, Ophelia, Gertrude, Cleopatra, Titania, Emilia, Imogen and others. Having also performed these roles in full-scale productions, Claire Bloom brings an engaging blend of intimacy and professionalism to Shakespeare's Women. The 54-minute video employs a simple, effective technique: Bloom, an attractive woman at 69 years, begins with a brief introduction to each play, placing the role in the context of the drama as a whole. Next, Bloom recites a set speech from memory, delivering her lines with the same energy and passion that she exhibited as a rising star in London, Stratford, and eventually Broadway. As a rule, film clips from some of Claire Bloom's earliest, most memorable performances follow her more recent solo dramatizations.
A case in point is Bloom's role as Lady Anne to Laurence Olivier's Richard III, performed when she was still very young, and, by her own admission, inexperienced. As the documentary covers the full range of Bloom's theatrical experience, we witness the unique perspective of an actor who, arguably, understands Shakespeare's heroines remarkably well because she has played all the major roles. Yet Bloom candidly admits that, as an aspiring young actress, she was fortunate to be offered major roles. Her real breakthrough - a "very heightened moment of my life" - occurred when, still a young woman of 21, she performed the role of Juliet in a 1955 production. For Claire Bloom, this role was a turning point in her career. First we see the older actor deliver the speech in which Juliet eagerly awaits the consummation of her secret marriage to Romeo. The camera shifts to a film segment from the 1955 production in which a younger Claire Bloom is speaking lines from the same passage. Why was this production so memorable? In commenting on Shakespeare's tragedy of the two star-crossed lovers, Bloom muses:
It's about a sexually extremely aware young girl - not an English virgin by any means - an Italian woman waiting for the fulfillment of her love. It is hot stuff. She's fourteen. She's full of passion and sexual desire, waiting . . . eagerly for her wedding night. And it's wonderfully done by Shakespeare, who knew everything about everybody. And knew everything about a fourteen-year girl waiting for her wedding night too. . . .
"Acting is a peculiar thing," reflects Bloom, "because when you are young enough to play these roles, you don't have enough understanding about sexual power. So that by the time you're really ready to do this you're far too old to portray convincingly a young girl. So you substitute understanding and intelligence for the fervour and passion of youth."
This documentary look at Shakespeare's famous female characters is well worth watching. After a long, distinguished career on stage and screen, Claire Bloom's energy and passion for Shakespeare remain undiminished. As she explains toward the end of the film, she has no intention of retiring:
The older roles of Shakespeare are so fulfilling that I wouldn't mind puttering on to the end, playing the Contessa in All's Well that Ends Well, and the old Queen Margaret, and the young lady in Henry VIII just kind of tottering gravewards playing these parts - even the smallest, which are all worth doing.
With her disarming frankness and deep reverence for performing Shakespeare,
Claire Bloom is likely to be playing the roles of Shakespeare's women for
many years to come. As a home video, Shakespeare's Women and Claire
Bloom will definitely appeal to anyone interested in Shakespeare's
intuitive grasp of female psychology.
Copyright 2000 George Hanna. All rights reserved. This article may not be reproduced or duplicated without the written consent of its author.
George Hanna
Department of Arts, Commerce and Education (ACE)
Grande Prairie Regional College
10726 - 106 Ave.
Grande Prairie, Alberta
T8V 5B1 Canada
(780) 539-2090