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About Oregon daily emerald. (Eugene, Or.) 1920-2012 | View Entire Issue (Feb. 9, 1978)
V oltaire (Continued from Page 4B) Should the production move on to Washington, D.C., it will be the first time since 1974, when UT's Our Town won na tional recognition for excellence. r> wounding out this year’s perfor mances, the UT will join with the University dance department March 3-4 and 8-11 for its annual concert of original dance. Stories to be Told, three short plays from South American playwright Osvaldo Dragon, will be presented April 14-15 and 19-22. The three productions will be The Abces sed Tooth," ‘The Story of Panchito Gon zalez” and “The Story of the Man Who Turned into a Dog.” A Moliere classic, the title not yet chosen, will be presented April 28-29 and May 3-6. Finally, Tom Stoppard's Tragedies, is scheduled for May 26, 27, and 31 and June 1-3. All productions start at 8 p.m. Tickets are $3 and $4 for Robinson Theatre produc tions, and $2.50 for plays in the Arena and Pocket theaters. University students and senior citizens can purchase tickets to all productions for half price. The Box Office is open from noon to 5 p.m. — noon to 9 p.m. on production nights — and can be called at 686-4191. By Eric Maloney Photos by Erich Boekelheide 1 ,lr ——— ,J Candide features a thrust stage, in which the audience sits on bleachers on three sides of the stage. The innovation gives the production a three-dimensional effect. High Anxiety Too much Brooks, not enough spoof It may still be safe to say that Mel Brooks is a genius. His com edy has delighted millions of moviegoers. He has added new dimensions to comedy on the silver screen. Most of all, he has created — if not by accident, then by deviant design — a genre of parody movies that will be copied for years to come. All empty flattery aside, Mel Brooks' High Anxiety is less than a I to a frazzle during a session with his analyst and have a man who thinks he's a cocker spaniel hump his leg. It’s a simple enough plot. Brooks, playing Dr. Richard H. Thomdyke, arrives to take over the head position of the prestigi ous California Psycho-Neurotic Institute for the Very, Very Nervous. Amidst the confusion of which scene was Hitchcock’s orig By DAVID COURSEN classic. At its best Anxiety is mediocre. At its worst it is disap pointing. That isn't to say a movie billed as a spoof of Alfred Hitchcock thril lers, that is filled with quaint dialogue, cut jokes and boorish buffoonery, cannot be fun. High Anxiety is funny. It just isn’t the type of “funny" that Mel Brooks fans have come to expect and enjoy. From the first scene Brooks’ socko and spaghetti comedy ac tion wraps the moviegoer in a thick gooey mess of psuedo-intrigue. It's almost too thick to be com pared to wet pasta. But what the heck, everyone knows what’s going to happen, it’s a Mel Brooks movie, right? That may be the main problem with High Anxiety: it’s too much of a Mel Brooks movie. There’s too much Brooks and not enough Hitchcock spoof. Only Mel Brooks could be accosted by a flasher while leaving an airport, get beat inal and which is Brooks’ spoof, the moviegoer realizes that some thing is not right at the institute. The whole mess is revealed by a dippy but lovable chauffeur (Ron Carey, of TV’s Barney Miller) who comes right out and tells the doc tor several times that it's not safe for man or cocker spaniel at the institute by the sea. But Brooks, like every main character Hitchcock has ever painted, doesn't listen to the mut tered warnings and wanders through a maze of craziness into the dutches of two of the most sniveling and convincing villains that ever graced the screen: Nurse Diesel and Dr. Montague. Nurse Diesel is a kind of cross between a Nazi version of the wicked witch of the West and Dolly Parton’s bra. Played brilliantly by television regular Cloris Leach man, Diesel talks as if her jaw was perpetually wired shut and seems to have a reasonable de sire to put Dr. Thorndyke six feet Mel Brooks is attacked by birds in “High AnxietyBrooks' tribute to Alfred Hitchcock. under. Dr. Montague, on the other hand, is sniveled into existence by Harvey Kerman, another televi sion regular who probably learned his trade as Carol Burnett’s hilari ous side-kick. All the action revolves around Diesel and Montague’s plot to kill Thorndyke and his naive evasions through standard bumbling. If that seems a bit much, try weaving scenes from Hitchcock’s master pieces Vertigo, Psycho and The Birds into the plot, mix them with two or three sub-plots and shake well. At first you get it got it got it got it. And then, kerplunk, you ain’t got it. But, through all the comedy and klutziness, there is still that dis turbing twinge that something is out of place. It's Brooks. High Anxiety is his sixth film. In five previous ventures Brooks managed to delight and intrigue his audiences with jabs at bigotry in Blazing Saddles, slices at hor ror in Young Frankenstein and just plain slap stick in Silent Movie. But somewhere along the plot line Brooks overpowered his support ing actors and took Anxiety's buffoonery hostage. From that moment on he calls the shots and pours his image over the movie like molasses. That may be the only fault of High Anxiety. If Mel Brooks had stayed behind the camera and let Leachman, Kerman,Madeline Kahn and the rest of the cast carry the plot, it might have been fun nier. Rapid Printing Typing • Theses & Dissertations Editing • Resumes • Design & Layout • Advertising Cooperative Printing 485-4899 • 762 E. 13th (next to Excelsior) HOURS: 7:30 a.m. ** p.m Monday — Friday 9 a m 6 n.m. 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