A carnival barker type assures us that this exotic creature — who “exposes himself to crowds who gape and yawp” — looks like nobody else on the planet. His research led him to England. Although Cooper's roles in the 2015 films Aloha and Joy earned him two additional nominations, his performance as the severely deformed Joseph Merrick in the Broadway revival The Elephant Man garnered more recognition. "It wasn't a big planned thing. Bradley Cooper as John Merrick in the play "The Elephant Man" at the Booth Theater. "She was excited. Both tell the true story of a severely-deformed London man named Joseph Merrick (John in the film and play) who's put on display as an attraction at a freak show -- known as the Elephant Man. Nearly 30 years later, roles in films like "American Hustle," "Silver Linings Playbook" and "The Hangover" have made Cooper one of the biggest movie stars in the world -- and, don't forget, People Magazine's Sexiest Man Alive in 2011. By Petra Halbur Nov 11th, 2014, 8:00 pm . The transition is impressive and one that has garnered the actor critical praise and acclaim. The play closed in 1981 after eight previews and 916 regular performances. And then I just thought, 'Wait a second. Cooper's interest in "The Elephant Man" continued to grow. ", "Yeah, it's true. Bradley Cooper transformed by "The Elephant Man" His movies have made more than $2 billion worldwide and earned him two Oscar nominations, but for Bradley Cooper, … I thought I was going to do the thesis, I was doing research. Watch CBS News anytime, anywhere with the our 24/7 digital news network. "Was this dream [to do the show on Broadway] born in Williamstown, or was this a dream that was hatched a long time ago?" “Before I spoke with people,” he says, “I did not think of all these things, because there was no one to bother to think them for. "I was young, like, 11 or 12. His parents were sceptical of his career choice until they saw him play the part of John Merrick in an excerpt from the play. The 1980 film stars John Hurt, Anthony Hopkins and Anne Bancroft. Also Read | 'A Star Is Born' Cast: All Actors In Bradley Cooper's Directorial Debut. How did his mom react? He made his way to the hospital where Merrick lived and was studied until he died in 1890 at the age of 27. "She's in seventh heaven, she's loving it," Cooper said on Oscar Night. The play retells the real-life story of Merrick’s “rehabilitation” under the tutelage of the rising young surgeon Frederick Treves (Mr. Nivola), who transports his unlikely protégé from sideshow squalor to upper-class gentility. But once that pose is struck, much of the actor’s work is done. "the elephant man" bradley cooper 2015 tony award voters original press booklet. Stream CBSN live or on demand for FREE on your TV, computer, tablet, or smartphone. . The Elephant Man: In brief. The story left such an impression on Cooper that he performed the role of Merrick for his master's thesis in drama school in New York. In interviews, he has said that he has been fascinated by Merrick’s story since he was a boy. "When I saw 'The Elephant Man,' I knew it. He has a great deal more depth and ability than those Hangover films allow him to show. It seems fitting that Mr. Cooper is broader and more conspicuously muscular than his best-known, relatively lithe-bodied predecessors in the role. thick paper stock full color pages. It is Mr. Pomerance’s firmly underlined point that, whether he is the object of ridicule among street mobs or of fawning praise among aristocrats, Merrick is always a mirror to a flawed and frightened society. The Elephant Man-Bradley Cooper. In the show’s elegant centerpiece scene, a succession of people — including Treves, the celebrated actress Mrs. Kendal (Ms. Clarkson), a hospital head (Henry Stram) and a stately bishop (Anthony Heald) — all speak of how much Merrick is “like me.”. "Honestly, it was something that sort of overtook me," he said. And movies like 'Platoon' or especially 'Stand By Me,' cause 'Stand By Me' was all about train tracks with these kids. Reflected by Mr. Nivola in liquid eyes that are at odds with his rigid stance, Treves’s conflict between rule-bound propriety and inner unease summons the soul-shaking crises of faith memorably described by eminent Victorians like Thomas Carlyle and John Stuart Mill. That’s because the only glimpse we’ve been allowed so far of the title character — and more important, of the man playing him — has been as a shadow behind a thin but view-obstructing curtain. In this version, it is Treves to whom we look for emotional complexity. Review: Bradley Cooper is The Elephant Man in Broadway Revival And now I am emotionally compromised. . Charlie Heaton, who plays troubled teen Jonathan Byers in the Netflix sci-fi hit Stranger Things, is set to star in a BBC1 biopic about Joseph Merrick — better known as The Elephant Man. But her interpretation throws off the rhythms of the dialogue and denies us the more basic satisfactions of Mrs. Kendal’s artful, parrying wit. On 60 Minutes, Bradley Cooper talked with Steve Kroft about his transformation into Joseph Merrick inThe Elephant Man on Broadway. (In the printed script, Mr. Pomerance cautions, “No one with any history of back trouble should attempt the part of Merrick as contorted.”) But once that pose is struck, much of the actor’s work is done. Bradley Cooper will be heading to London to perform a 12-week run of The Elephant Man, following its run in New York Critics are calling Bradley Cooper … The Elephant Man is a play by Bernard Pomerance. It premiered at the Hampstead Theatre in London on 7 November 1977. That was interesting!" Without help from makeup, prosthetics, or costumes, Cooper … Previews for The Elephant Man … geez. (So, for the record, did Rupert Graves, who played opposite Mr. From left, Bradley Cooper, Alessandro Nivola and Patricia Clarkson in a revival of Bernard Pomerance’s “The Elephant Man,” set in Victorian England. But the point registers quite clearly, thank you, even in a less openly didactic interpretation like this one, which was previously staged at the Williamstown Theater Festival. Bradley Cooper deservedly won a Tony nomination for his performance as John Merrick, the Victorian "freak" for whom the surgeon Frederick Treves at the London Hospital became physician and benefactor, and it's a pleasure to welcome him to London in this expert revival of a beautiful play, which arrives from the Williamstown Theatre Festival via last year's Broadway season. It later played in repertory at the National Theatre in London. Soon enough, Mr. Cooper is on full-frontal, clinical display, wearing nothing but a pair of period-appropriate underpants and a face as neutral as a death mask. please view images of actual item with magnifier and ask questions. It crystallized, and I said, 'This is what I want to do with my life.'". Ms. Clarkson, one of the canniest actresses working, would seem to be trying to avoid stereotype by portraying Mrs. Kendal as a hazy, trans-Atlantic eccentric who speaks as if in a dream. Designed by Timothy R. Mackabee, Mr. Ellis’s “The Elephant Man” makes discreetly poetic use of sliding curtains to echo imagery about illusion and concealment. His performance in The Elephant Man landed him four nominations, including a nod for a Tony Award for Best Actor in a Play Cooper laughed. Bradley Cooper steps out in London in casual T-shirt and shorts ahead of Elephant Man performance By Kate Thomas And Joanna Crawley For Mailonline. But it is Mr. Cooper whom most ticket buyers have come to see. Crudup.) Bradley Cooper, so excellent in 2006's Three Days of Rain, returns to Broadway in Bernard Pomerance's period piece about the severely deformed Joseph Merrick. He is, as he should be, the elephant in the room. But the script’s arc is shaped not so much by Merrick’s transformation as by the reactions to it. One imagines that someone as famous as Mr. Cooper has ample experience of what this feels like. The epigrammatic and empathetic Mrs. Kendal, who knows from striking poses and being gawped at, is a scene-stealing showboat. It is a strenuous role, for sure, demanding a hunched, muscle-taxing posture for the play’s duration. From then on, he is not Bradley Cooper, or even someone in the mold of one of the finely detailed neurotics he has portrayed so compellingly in films like “Silver Linings Playbook” or “American Hustle.”. Bradley Cooper—in the role that inspired him to become an actor—leads an ensemble production of The Elephant Man on Broadway. It's absolutely surreal. Bradley Cooper, who stars as the grotesquely deformed John Merrick, unlikely darling of Victorian society, may well be the most beautiful feature of all. When Bradley Cooper visited Jimmy Fallon on "The Tonight Show" Friday, the two attempted to talk about Cooper’s turn in the title role of a Broadway production of “The Elephant Man.” Bradley Cooper in ‘The Elephant Man’ Offers Gorgeous Along With The Beast With Cooper in the lead, the play takes on new meaning, teaching us what it’s like to be a movie star in ways E! "I'm someone who thinks big -- I NEVER thought that I'd be able to do 'The Elephant Man' on Broadway," he replied. But like Merrick, she is more a notion in motion than a full character. Now, things just come out of my mouth which are true.” These include implicit, gentle rebukes of the moralistic and hypocritical code that governs imperial Britain. "That was . "There's something about this guy's spirit that connected with people, and it connected with me in a pretty fundamentally profound way," Cooper said. Though the part of Merrick made a one-season wonder of Philip Anglim when he originated the role on Broadway in 1979 — and has since attracted the likes of David Bowie (one of Mr. Anglim’s replacements) and Billy Crudup (who appeared in the 2002 revival) — it doesn’t allow for radical variation or nuance. Photo: Joan Marcus. But it was his father's insistence on watching one particular movie that changed everything. And Mr. Nivola delivers it beautifully. ", His father, Charles, who passed away three years ago, would show him classic films like "Apocalypse Now, " "The Deer Hunter," "Taxi Driver" and "Raging Bull." Why don't I get a round-trip ticket?'". Wow, I'm glad that's over.". Serena Altschul catches up with Cooper and fi... California Privacy/Information We Collect. Extreme beauty … Bradley Cooper, Alessandro Nivola, and Patricia Clarkson in The Elephant Man. I was mainly excited, because I saw how much he was excited, and I idolized him.". Ensconced in a private hospital suite and attired like a Victorian gentleman (Clint Ramos did the costumes), Merrick says that perhaps his head is so big because it is so full of dreams. Clarkson has only done a few nude scenes, although one of them was live on stage during the run of The Elephant Man with Bradley Cooper. Technically, the carny is describing the grotesquely deformed John Merrick, who makes his living as a sideshow attraction in Victorian England. "The Elephant Man" Director Scott Ellis and Bradley Cooper rehearse a scene from the Broadway revival of "The Elephant Man." When his lauded performance as John Merrick, AKA the Elephant Man, completes its limited run at the Booth Theatre on February 22, Cooper and the … Instead, what this actor has become is a big blank slate onto which others may project whatever they choose. The production's Broadway debut in 1979 at the Booth Theatre was produced by Richmond Crinkley and Nelle Nugent, and directed by Jack Hofsiss. There has been much discussion of the astonishing reality attached to this silhouette. The last time Bradley Cooper was on Broadway, in 2006’s Three Days of Rain, ... and the results are evident in the opening-weekend box office of The Elephant Man. Feast your eyes upon this image while you can, and perhaps be so good as to feel a little guilty for doing so. As Peter Pan is traditionally portrayed by a gamine actress, and Hairspray’ s … But what he brings to this production is the weight of years of being stared at as an adult, and he is the first star of his stature to take on the part in our post-Warhol world of celebrity obsession. Bradley Cooper, left, and Alessandro Nivola in "The Elephant Man," directed by Scott Ellis, at the Booth Theater. I have money saved. O.K. The staging doesn’t hit you over the head with implicit metaphors or sermonizing, which is just as well, since the script sometimes does. ", "Oh, 100 percent, yeah. original 2015 tony awards voters "the elephant man" broadway production 4 page press booklet. There’s strong work also from Stram as the head of the hospital, a brisk pragmatist not without decency; and … He earned a second nomination earlier this year for "American Hustle. And so me and my friends would pretend we were in 'Stand By Me.'". It ran Off-Broadway from 14 January to 18 March 1979, at The Theatre at St. Peter's. ", Altschul asked, "So when you sat here in this theater as a kid, did you think at all, 'I'd love to be an actor'? This thesis was delivered most baldly in Sean Mathias’s 2002 production with Mr. Crudup, which used Brechtian supertitles. Published: 10:03 EDT, 28 May 2015 | … In 2012 he brought his interpretation to the highly-regarded Williamstown Theatre Festival in Massachusetts. Symbolic heft, worn with anonymous grace under considerable physical stress, is what’s required of anyone playing the title character in Mr. Pomerance’s carefully arranged, instructive drama, which has been directed by Scott Ellis and also stars Patricia Clarkson and an excellent Alessandro Nivola. Photograph of John Hurt as "Joseph Merrick" in the Elephant Man … It was a joke for people around me that this little kid was saying he's going to be an actor. Bradley Cooper is surprising. Bradley Cooper as transformed into the Elephant Man. Credit Sara Krulwich/The New York Times The production, which has had huge success at the box office on Broadway, will run at the Theater Royal Haymarket in the West End of the city from May 19 to Aug. 8. What psychological insight “The Elephant Man” provides is generated less by Merrick than by the response to him of others — or to be exact, one other. But for much of the audience, the reference might as well be to the guy People magazine once crowned “the Sexiest Man Alive,” the movie star Bradley Cooper. Not to worry, dear theatergoers and film fans. Copyright © 2021 CBS Interactive Inc.All rights reserved. already, can we just go ahead and pull back that curtain? Even if you can’t identify the man onstage as the one who starred in the blockbuster “Hangover” film franchise, you’re always aware of the sheer, looming presence of him. ", "Yup! asked Altschul. "So this is kind of a dream come true for you? His movies have made more than $2 billion worldwide and earned him two Oscar nominations, but for Bradley Cooper, this may be the most personal role yet ... and, as he explains to Serena Altschul, the realization of a long-standing dream: When Bradley Cooper was a kid in the Philadelphia suburbs, he'd sit for hours in his local theater watching movies with his dad: "Oh yeah, and there used to be an organ down there on the bottom right that they would play when you were coming in-between shows. The Oscars are a long way from reenacting movies as a kid in his backyard: "I would just come out of my house and just walk, which my mother hated, 'cause she thought it was so dangerous. But as … American writer Bernard Pomerance told his version in a 1977 play. © 2014 CBS Interactive Inc. All Rights Reserved. He took his mom to both ceremonies. Serena Altschul catches up with Cooper and finds out why "The Elephant Man" is the role of a lifetime. "And all of a sudden I'm at the London Hospital crossing Whitechapel Road to where he was, and walked in the gardens that he walked at midnight. I mean, it was incredible.". ", It's been a surreal two years since we last caught up with the 39-year-old native of Jenkintown, Pa., just before he was nominated for an Oscar for "Silver Linings Playbook.". Within a few moments, Mr. Cooper — without makeup or prosthetics — will have slowly and painstakingly distorted his form and features beyond recognition. A current of electric impatience runs through the audience during the opening scenes of the sturdy revival of Bernard Pomerance’s “The Elephant Man,” which opened on Sunday night at the Booth Theater. His father introduced him to films like The Elephant Man, which inspired him to be an actor. Cooper has ample experience of what this feels like hunched, muscle-taxing posture for the play closed 1981... 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