Who’s Afraid of
Virginia Woolf? (1966) – I only recently encountered Edward Albee’s play of
the same name and knew immediately I had to see Mike Nichols’s well-regarded
film adaptation (his cinematic directorial debut). Fortunately, Nichols’s film version avoids
the trap that most filmings of plays tend to encounter; where some films rely
too much on the power of the dialogue itself, what ends up emerging is an
uncinematic talkfest slavishly devoted to the play text. In the case of Virginia Woolf, though, Albee’s words are brought to life by two
powerhouse performances. Richard Burton
and Elizabeth Taylor star as George and Martha, a beleaguered history professor
and his browbeating wife. Even if you
don’t view the film as a side narrative to the real-life relationship between
Liz and Dick, their work here is electrifying, the repartee arcing off each
other in rapid-fire bursts of emasculating zingers and biting droll humor. A part of me will always wonder what could
have been if James Mason and Bette Davis had been cast (as Albee hoped), but there’s
no doubt that Burton and Taylor are first-rate as George and Martha. The film finds them at a late-night party
with a new biology professor and his wife, played by George Segal and Sandy
Dennis. Segal and Dennis are suitable
enough (though I’m surprised Dennis won the Best Supporting Actress Oscar), but
their bigger strength is in knowing not to attempt to upstage Burton and Taylor. And the black-and-white cinematography is a
stroke of inspiration, allowing nothing to distract from the top-notch
performances before us. And for what it’s
worth, just last year the Library of Congress identified this film for
preservation.That does it for this week’s edition of “Monday at the Movies.” We’ll see you here next week!
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