The Roman Spring of Mrs. Stone: The Television Movie

 

THE ROMAN SPRING OF MRS. STONE

This review is part of the Summer Under the Stars Blogathon. Today's star is Anne Bancroft.

Federico Fellini gave us La Dolce Vita, which was actually anything but sweet. Tennessee Williams touched on how deceptive a decadent life was with his novella The Roman Spring of Mrs. Stone. Having been previously adapted into a film (which curiously was also part of a Summer Under the Stars review), we dive yet again into the underbelly of the Eternal City with this television adaptation. Better acted than its predecessor for the most part, The Roman Spring of Mrs. Stone is still slightly unbelievable but entertaining.  

Broadway star Karen Stone (Helen Mirren) has survived a disastrous run as Juliet financed by her husband Tom (Brian Dennehy). She is soon widowed, compounding her misery and finding comfort in isolation. Her friend Christopher (Roger Allam) tries to convince her to find a delicious Italian rentboy like his Guido, but she wants to be alone.

Well, not entirely alone. She if fine with escorts provided by the Contessa (Anne Bancroft) for dinner and dancing, but no sex. She does not even object to being taken for a ride whenever one of these pretty young things gives her a sob story meant to milk her finances, of which the Contessa takes a cut. Things change, however, when the Contessa brings Conte Paolo di Lio (Olivier Martinez). He, like the other gigolos, is pretty. However, he is both courtlier and more aristocratic than the others. Paolo is also more tempestuous and prone to anger. Despite all logic, Karen begins a sexual liaison with the handsome young Italian count.

Karen begins wining and dining our luscious young lover, but will genuine love come between them? Will the financially strapped Contessa manage to get her cut from a disinterested Paolo? Will the Roman spring of Mrs. Stone turn into a winter of discontent?

As with the film version, I never fully bought the premise of Williams' novella. I struggled with the idea that Karen Stone would submit to Paolo no matter how pretty he was. Still, The Roman Spring of Mrs. Stone requires me to roll with things, and here I did. This is a well-acted television adaptation thanks in large part to Helen Mirren.

Granted, we do get to see her in the altogether a couple of times, which is a bit surprising. However, Mirren's Karen Stone is surprisingly strong, perhaps too strong to believe she would succumb to Paolo. She was sympathetic in her loneliness, fully aware that these men were interested in her money but also willing to submit to one of them less for his looks than for his initial manner.

Not that Martinez would not be easy to fall for. He is quite pretty in The Roman Spring of Mrs. Stone. The part overall never fully worked for me, as I have yet to see a version where the callow youth could possibly be in love or even convince me that he was capable of such a thing. Sometimes what were meant as his rages or resentments about Italy's loss of World War II came across as exaggerated, almost funny. However, as the part is not particularly good, Martinez was perfectly adequate as Paolo.

As a side note, I found Rodrigo Santoro as the Young Man who stalks Karen Stone and is more brazen about his sexual desires to be prettier than Martinez. I would have thought it might have been better if they had switched roles. However, I figure that Santoro was not as big a name as Martinez, hence the casting choice. 

Anne Bancroft in her final on-screen appearance was at times a bit broad in her Contessa. Her performance seemed a bit exaggerated, almost parody. She brought back memories of her abysmal performance in the updated adaptation of Great Expectations, where she played essentially a female drag queen. Almost everything about Bancroft seemed exaggerated: the mannerisms, the accent (strange since Bancroft was of Italian heritage). She does better when working with Martinez and has one good moment at the end when raging at Mrs. Stone. Her tirade about how the Americans destroyed her world, down to having the great leader Mussolini hung in the public square, is surprisingly effective. 

The best performance was that of Allam as Christopher, the Tennessee Williams type figure. Openly gay, openly bitchy, Allam as "not Tennessee Williams" was the most interesting figure in The Roman Spring of Mrs. Stone. I would have liked to have followed him and Guido more than Karen and Paolo. Allam had some of the best lines in Martin Sherman's screenplay. When regaling Karen with a particularly salacious story, she blanches. "Well, it's true," Christopher coos, adding, "at least, it's gossip". Later when attempting to comfort Karen and dissuade her from thinking herself a talentless has-been, he says, "What's talent but the ability to get away with something?". 

Director Robert Allan Ackerman kept things flowing well, and John Altman's score was effective, haunting or romantic when needed. 

The Roman Spring of Mrs. Stone is not perfect, but everyone in front of and behind the camera made it an enjoyable experience.  

8/10