Customer Reviews

Entrances: An American Director's Journey

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This is a poorly written, entirely inaccurate book. But that is fate. Schneider did not have a chance to edit and rewrite it, and the result is chaotic. Had he lived, it might have done greater justice to his tenacity, if not his talent.I read this with chagrin.

If there are directors out there who are at all interested in directing straight plays and especially the works of Beckett, Pinter and the other absurdist, you really ought to listen to what the highly esteemed Alan S. has to say about his experiences. Perhaps more valuable than any text book on directing. I refer back to this book whenever I am preparing an avant garde or post modern play.

From ENTRANCES: "Dad continued to see my shows for as long as possible, but whether he understood them much, I doubt. He always found the proceedings 'interesting', and was amazed that all the actors were able to remember all their lines."

Which is exactly *my* reaction also. The miraculous thing about theater isn't theater itself, but the simple fact that stage-actors have the ability to memorize all that dialog. So even if you hate the very concept of stage-shows the way I do, it's still interesting to read about.

From ENTRANCES: "But Bert, who seemed most anxious to rehearse and make changes, proved as unstable and unreliable as ever. He always found some reason for not rehearsing. One day he got a letter from someone, which he insisted on reading to me. 'How can you, Bert Lahr', it said, 'who has charmed the youth of America as The Cowardly Lion in THE WIZARD OF OZ, appear in this Communistic, Atheistic, and Existentialist play?'. There were tears in Bert's eyes as he begged me to explain to him what 'Existentialist' meant."

I'm convinced that John Lahr became a theater critic as a way to somehow apologize for the fact that his father insisted on schlocking up that particular production of WAITING FOR GODOT.