"Berma's voice, in which there subsisted not one scrap of inert matter refractory to the mind, betrayed no visible sign of that surplus of tears which, because they had been unable to soak into it, one could feel trickling down the voice of Aricie or of Ismene, but had been delicately refined down to its smallest cells like the instrument of a master violinist in whom, when one says that he produces a beautiful sound, one means to praise not a physical peculiarity but a superiority of soul; and, as in the classical landscape where in the place of a vanished nymph there is an inanimate spring, a discernible and concrete intention had been transformed into a certain limpidity of tone, strange, appropriate and cold. Berma's arms, which the lines of verse themselves, by the same emissive force that made the voice issue from her lips, seemed to raise on to her bosom like leaves displaced by a gush of water; her stage presence, her poses, which she had gradually built up, which had was to modify yet further, and which were based up reasonings altogether more profound than those of which traces could be seen in the festures of her fellow-actors, but reasonings that had lost their orignaal deliberation, had melted into a sort of radiance whereby the sent throbbing, round the person of the heroine, rich and complex elements which the fascinated spectator nevertheless took not for a triumph of dramatic artistry but for a manifestation of life; those white veils themselves, which, tenuous and clinging, seemed to be of a living substance and to have been woven by the suffering, half-pagan, half-Jansenist, around which they drew themselves like a frail and shrinking cocoon - all these, voice, posture, gestures, veils, round this embodiment of an idea which a line of poetry is (an embodiment that, unlike our human bodies, is not an opaque screen, but a purified, spiritualised garment), were merely additional envelopes which, instead of concealing, showed up in greater splendour the soul that had assimilated them to itself and had spread itself through them, lava-flows of different substances, grown translucent, the superimposition of which causes only a richer refraction of the imprisoned, central ray that pierces through them, and makes more extensive, more precious and more beautiful the flame-drenched matter in which it is enshrined. So Berma's interpretation was, around Racine's work, a second work, quickened also by the breath of genius."
Marcel Proust, The Guermantes Way, pp. 44-45
Proust carries on his exegesis on Berma's performance. It got me thinking about art and film, and, as my students will let you know in no uncertain terms, I am a complete film whore. When I was reading Proust's reflections on Berma I could only think about Meryl Streep. She's such an institution now it's almost cliche to say that she's the greatest actor, male or female, of our generation, and how fortunate we are to have witnessed her at her peak. There's an entire generation which, sadly, only remembers her from Mama Mia and has no sense of how she dominated her craft for decades. Here's a few short clips from some of her early films. Manhattan and The Deer Hunter are arguably two of my top five film favorites of all time, and she plays key roles in both of them. She was just beginning her career when she snagged the small role of Woody Allen's ex-wife in Manhattan. If I remember correctly, she took the small role in The Deer Hunter to spend as much time as possible with her lover John Cazale who was dying. Oh, and apropos of nothing, I guess, I learned recently that Robert DeNiro paid Cazale's medical bills at the time, which makes me admire him all the more.
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| Kramer vs Kramer. I was also looking for scenes from Manhattan, but couldn't find the one I was looking for. I suspect that Kramer vs. Kramer. It's amazing how much she looks like my ex-wife Brenda when we fell in love in college. |
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| Sophie's Choice. If you learn a foreign language just so that you can turn around and use it as an accent when speaking English then you, as Shakespeare reminds us, transcend the narrow world like a Colossus. |
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| French Lieutenant's Woman. Here she expresses an entire world in one look. |
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| The Deer Hunter. I'm always amazed when people criticize this movie, including her performance. This may very well be the greatest American movie of all time. She doesn't have huge scenes, but she dominates the screen and in class Streep fashion conveys endless emotions without saying a word. |
Note to self: use the phrase "limpidity of tone" in polite company, and soon.
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