Dancing in Lead Shoes
Edgar Ulmer, noting actor William Dieterle’s girth and tendency to play knights in armour, claimed his nickname in the German theatre was “the Iron Stove,” adding, “He was a big guy, not talented…”
As a director, WD could be pretty dynamic, as we’ve seen here recently. But once in a while he could still strap on the metalwear and stomp a movie to smithereens ‘neath his clanking, rollicking hornpipe. Moisten your index finger and turn the page to the Auteurs’ Notebook, where you may learn about the berserkly fatuous horrors of MAGIC FIRE, a botched Wagner biopic which bends the knee before Art, only to have Art teabag it contemptuously in the face.
shadowplay 
August 27, 2009 at 2:38 pm
Interesting the Ken Russell never touched Wagner — save for Cosima in Mahler.
August 27, 2009 at 3:02 pm
Did he ever plan to? I know he intended to make The Angels, about Beethoven, after The Devils. I think that might be the great missing film in his career.
A shame Ken doesn’t have a King Ludwig to back him financially.
August 27, 2009 at 3:04 pm
ooh—I might hold off on reading this one until I’ve seen the film (just got my hands on it very recently!)
more Dieterle! good Dieterle, bad Dieterle–I can’t resist any of it!
August 27, 2009 at 3:05 pm
I think the review’s largely spoiler-free, but you might want to see it first anyway. But have alcohol to hand.
August 27, 2009 at 3:24 pm
MAGIC FIRE, as I remember it, is a truly dismal film. Not an entertaining piece of kitsch – just depressingly and deadeningly bad! My visceral dislike of Wagner doesn’t help, although I suspect a hardcore Wagnerite might loathe it even more.
August 27, 2009 at 3:34 pm
The best approach to Wagner is of course Patrice Chereau’s. Get yourself DVDs of his rendition of the Ring with Pierre Boulez conducting. Incredible.
August 27, 2009 at 4:06 pm
The music barely even makes an impression in Dieterle’s film. Although I should have said, the Auteurs’ Notebook would prefer it if we discuss the film over there.
August 27, 2009 at 4:43 pm
I’ve tried leaving comments at the Auteur’s Website, but found it way too complicated!
August 27, 2009 at 9:15 pm
LOVE the phrase about having Art teabag one in the face.
Haven’t seen the Chereau, alas. I would, however, recommend the Syberberg “Parsifal” — not to mention Flagstadt in Leisen’s “Big Broadcast of 1938” and “What’s Opera, Doc?” (Which, as I remember, is more “Tannhauser” than “Ring”).
August 27, 2009 at 9:27 pm
Wagner has certainly contributed a huge amount to cinema, as Mr. Coppola I’m sure would acknowledge.
A friend, more knowledgeable than I about the life of RW, suggests that the “fruity nincompoop” performance may be quite accurate. I think the film’s mistake is that nobody, until near the end, acts as if his dress and behaviour is particularly unusual.
August 27, 2009 at 9:37 pm
That “steal” image is a hoot, btw. Where’s Anton Walbrook when one needs him?
“Why do you want to wave azure scarves?”
“Why do you want to live?”
August 27, 2009 at 10:00 pm
I suppose the nearest Ken Russell ever got to Wagner was in his Strauss TV bio-pic DANCE OF THE SEVEN VEILS, shown once on BBC TV and now unavailable until the expiration of the Struss rights expires. At the time, I read about the Chereau production of THE RING abut did not know it was available on DVD.
Did not Alan Badel play Wagner? I know he reprised the role in a BBC TV production some years later.
August 27, 2009 at 10:28 pm
Mad Ken gets closer to Wagner than that: Paul Nicholas plays Wagner with vampire fangs in Lisztomania. I’m sure that’s why KR never made a full Wagner biopic, he’d already touched on the subject. And I get the impression he’s not altogether a fan.
Finally watched Walbrook in Gaslight. Simply marvelous.
I’m wondering if I could get hold of the Russell Strauss film through a BBC contact…
August 27, 2009 at 10:31 pm
When the Chereau Ring premiered at Bayureth “everyone” hated it. The next time the put it on “everyone” loved it. It wasn’t a “modern dress” production. Rather everyone was costumed in the period in whcih it was written. Wotan wore a handsome morning coat. He cut down on the magical nonsense (save for a dragon that unfolded like a giant origami sculpture) and emphasized the fact that the “Gods” had very human fialings. He found a very powerful emotional through line for it, resulting in Wotan and Brunhilde’s relationship becomign extremely moving in ways it had never been before.
Plus he found a Siegmund and Sieglinde who EVERYONE would want to boink. For once there was sex on stage rather than just in the ordhestra pit.
Being the supreme director of the physical any of the moves he put his singer/actors through here found there way into Queen Margot and Those Who Love Me Can Take the Train — particular the confrontation scene on the platform at “La Souterraine” in the latter.
August 28, 2009 at 5:23 am
being an enormous fan of Claude Debussy,I’d love to see Russell’s TV Monitor take on the composer with Oliver Reed…is this on DVD anywhere?
August 28, 2009 at 8:53 am
Yes, there’s an American box set of most of his BBC work — pretty sure it’s included.
The Chereau-Wagner sounds fascinating. YouTube clips LOOK fascinating — and quite cinematic in conception.
August 28, 2009 at 10:42 am
You can view Ken’s ‘Dance of the Seven Veils’ (Strauss film) at the BFI in London (not the Southbank which was the NFT) – you have to book a viewing in advance and the cost is £10 an hour. It’s worth it!
It was to be released on the ‘Ken Russell at the BBC’ DVD set but alas! ’twas not to be!
August 28, 2009 at 10:49 am
Yes, ‘The Debussy Film’ is on the Region 1 DVD set ‘Ken Russell at the BBC’ with a few others of Ken’s genius creations.
Last year there was a Ken Russell season at the BFI Southbank which a lot of his BBC output for ‘Monitor’ and ITV’s ‘Omnibus’. It was superb! Got see most of them. Wish they all could be cleaned up and released.
The TV series I have but not watched yet called ‘Wagner’ has Richard Burton playing Wagner.
August 28, 2009 at 11:53 am
Burton as Wagner is interesting. A friend suggests that Wagner’s bratty side might be, if anything, underplayed by Badel and Dieterle. The more I hear the more he sounds like a good subject for the Ken treatment.
Thanks for the info… next time I’m in London…
August 28, 2009 at 10:11 pm
David C, That clip is really good. I must save up for this DVD.
August 28, 2009 at 10:36 pm
It’s unfortunate that so much of Chereau’s work is hard to get ahold of.
August 29, 2009 at 7:27 am
thanks for the heads up on the BBC set
August 29, 2009 at 9:57 am
You’re welcome. Lots of good stuff in there, although sadly not his banned Strauss film.
August 30, 2009 at 4:29 pm
The ongoing ban on showing DANCE OF THE SEVEN VEILS suggests that the the heirs to the Richard Strauss estate are every bit as unpleasant as the man himself allegedly was.
In his memoir THE TURNING POINT, Klaus Mann (son of Thomas) describes his return to post-Nazi Germany and an encounter with the (utterly unrepentant) Richard Strauss. All he had to say about his Nazi connections was that “Herr Goebbels was a highly cultivated man, who always showed great appreciation of my music.”
What a truly loathsome individual! I live for the day when I can see Ken Russell give him the hatchet-job he deserves.
August 30, 2009 at 9:07 pm
I intend reading THE TURNING POINT soon since I’ve become fascinated by the whole exile question after reading WEIMAR IN EXILE. This sort of thing seems to run in musical families since the Wagners are little better as anybody who has seen Syberberg’s THE CONFESSIONS OF WINIFRED WAGNER knows. Klaus made one suicide attempt in the post-war era but succeeded a few years later. Was his despair at hearing comments like this responsible in view of what he experienced and knew about?
August 30, 2009 at 10:21 pm
I’ve got to get my hands on that book too. Dieterle seems to have been more involved with music and theatre people from his homeland than with fellow filmmakers. More on him soon, I hope.
August 31, 2009 at 9:35 am
You can borrow my copy – assuming I can find it!
August 31, 2009 at 10:53 am
Great, thanks! Need to bone up on my Germans.