On the Way

In a singularly drab Broadway theatrical season, last week's out-of-town tryouts promised some badly needed new color. Latest road reports:

Rashomon, a stage version (by Fay and Michael Kanin) of the widely admired Japanese movie, is a whodunit about the death of a nobleman in a medieval forest. There are four different versions of the crime, but the solution is left to the audience. Rashomon (opening on Broadway Jan. 27) beguiled Philadelphia with its fine acting by Claire Bloom, Rod Steiger, Noel Willman, Akim Tamiroff, Oscar Homolka. The fable may be inscrutable, but, said Variety, "for some playgoers it is exciting entertainment."

Tall Story, latest comedy by Howard Lindsay and Russell Grouse (Life with Father), pleased Philadelphia (and was bought immediately by Hollywood). Adapted from a rather more serious novel (The Homecoming Game), the story concerns an overly ethical professor of ethics (Hans Conried) faced with flunking a star basketball player before the big game. A fellow facultyman: Playwright Marc (The Green Pastures) Connelly, making one of his occasional appearances as an actor. Wrote the Philadelphia Inquirer's Henry T. Murdock: "An evening of hearty laughter with no complicating complexes." Opens on Broadway Jan. 29.

Redhead, a musical now being tuned up in Philadelphia for high-kicking Dancer Gwen (Damn Yankees) Verdon, is described by Lyricist Dorothy Fields: "This is a happy show. It does absolutely nothing for the theater." Translation: a likely Broadway hit (opening Feb. 5), with advance sales already past $1,000,000. The story: something about a dreamy London chick (Verdon), working in a turn-of-the-century waxworks, who gets tied up with a U.S. vaudeville strong man. In Washington, the Daily News's Critic Tom Donnelly called Redhead "a mad blend of Agatha Christie and Mack Sennett."

Requiem for a Nun is no requiem, and its "nun" is a 17th century word for whore. It was adapted by Novelist William Faulkner from his 1951 sequel to his 1930s shocker, Sanctuary. The story is a further look at Temple Drake (Ruth Ford), the Sanctuary college girl who landed in a Memphis brothel--and loved it. In Requiem, Temple has become a guilt-ridden, respectable wife, grappling for salvation. Boston critics agreed that it promised spiritual significance, but found it dramatically static. The Catholic Pilot's George E. Ryan commended it for "daring to grapple with the question of human guilt with no holds barred."

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