You come out of this flick knowing a whole lot about producing a play in vicky England and being marvelously entertained along the way. That was enough for me. I thought the film was enthralling.
In short, "The play's the thing..."
I don't have a clue what Duryea wanted, or was expecting. The film was a capsule of several months of many folks' lives, told in vignettes. You don't know much about what was going prior, you don't really get to see how it all ends. So what? Kinda like life, non? The 'point' is about making it happen, about the sheer drudgery of making something nearly magical occur before a paying audience. I suppose one could say the story is about 'process,' the main character is the birthing of a play, not a bio of the playwrights. The acting is largely superb, the costumes and music exquisite. It's long, sure...perhaps one production number too long and perhaps they dallied a bit overmuch setting it up, but that too was okay with me. This film pays off better than almost anything 'musical' I've seen since All That Jazz. It's not quite up to Nashville or Cabaret as musical, but, hey...I'll take it!
On vid, I fear it won't work as well. (So many things don't...) This is a big screen flick...but i plan to rent it anyway. See it on the big screen first, if you can...