Recently, we went to see a live performance of Noises Off! at the Seattle Rep. It was a jolly good time, so we ordered up the disk to compare the filmed version to the live show. On paper (well, if you ignore the reviews) it sounds good: Bogdonovich directing, Caine, Burnett, Ritter and Reeve (the two dead R's) acting. Why, even Marilu Henner has a starring role, post Elaine.
So, we pop the disk in and the set is nearly identical to the stage version. I mean, really--which makes me think that the script is very specific about such things, seeing as the play is all about timing and blocking. The screenplay is also, all things considered, remarkably like the script. Okay, they added these ludicrous Broadway bookends, but otherwise it is a faithful rendition down to the marrow.
Which means it's a perfect example of how you can really fuck up a funny play and make an unfunny movie. First thing to remember is that you should choose your material carefully. This is a horrible movie idea--the play needs to be run on a full view of the stage. Doors open left, right and center with people moving in carefully orchestrated measures that work on two levels: one, the level of the actors on stage playing actors on stage playing actors in a play that requires orchestrated measures, and secondly that the actors on stage playing actors that are involved in a physical comedy within their own worlds as they are attempting to play actors on stage in a play that requires orchestrated measures. The audience needs to see it unravel full frame.
In addition, the reason the play is so successful is that it implicates the audience. Not only are we the audience, but we become the audience for the play within a play. We have two roles as well, which is not bad considering that we just get to sit there while the play unfolds and flaps around in front of us. Too bad that Bogdonovich didn't get this at all--even when the cast is falling to pieces in front of a live audience, there are absolutely no reaction shots from the crowd. They might as well be playing to an empty house, and then who the hell cares if the highwire act falls to the ground?
Which brings us to point three, which is that the cast was kind of horrible. Caine plays his earnest Englishman, but Ritter's sense of his character was awful, especially evidenced in his rushed lines. Everybody phones it in, and in a movie where they should be chewing the scenery, they all lay there like the dead fish on the plate. There's no damn life in it.
In the movie, Nicolette Sheridan plays a horribly boring Brooke Ashton/Vicki. In the Seattle Rep version, that character was played amazingly well by a local actress named Bhama Roget. Not only did she spend most of her time in her underwear, but her comic timing, physicality and presence all but lit up the stage for the other actors. A large part of my disappointment in the movie might simply be that I kept wishing that Sheridan would be magically replaced with Roget, so that I could see the part played one more time by her.
Where we saw it: DVD | We deign to rate it: 35 outta 100