Stooped and a Bit Slow, but Still Standing Tall - New York Times

Sara Krulwich/The New York TimesHis race, her religion — sharing a bond as minorities in the South: Vanessa Redgrave as Daisy Werthan, and James Earl Jones as her chauffeur in a revival of “Driving Miss Daisy.”

Contrary to popular opinion, giants still walk that tired, old corner of the earth called Broadway. Times being what they are, these giants are often penned into cramped quarters, which prevent them from stretching to their full height. But giants of the theater belong to a magnificent species that is fast disappearing. And when one shows up in your neighborhood, you polish your eyeglasses and go for a look.

Ms. Redgrave and Mr. Jones in “Driving Miss Daisy.”

James Earl Jones and Vanessa Redgrave are, by anyone’s reckoning, two of the last of these titans — stars of uncommon stature (in all senses) who, in combined years of experience, have known and commanded the stage for more than a century. Their fiery, shadow-casting presences have illuminated some of the most challenging roles in world theater. And I would see them in absolutely anything. Even “Driving Miss Daisy,” which opened on Monday night at the Golden Theater.

Ms. Redgrave plays the title character, and Mr. Jones her chauffeur, in David Esbjornson’s revival of Alfred Uhry’s 1987 play. If the production’s stars feel squeezed or confined by what is a very slender work, they never let on. They give responsible, intelligent performances that are infused with two old pros’ joy in the mastery of their craft. And they pull off the deft trick of registering as big as we want them to be without making the play in which they appear seem even smaller than it is.

First staged at Playwrights Horizons, “Driving Miss Daisy” ran for nearly 1,200 performances Off Broadway, and the sources of its appeal remain clear. In tracing the evolving relationship between an elderly Southern Jewish matron and her African-American driver in Atlanta during the mid-20th century, Mr. Uhry allows audiences to feel both patronizing toward, and admiring of, its geriatric odd couple. This combination of sentiments tends to make people glow with a pleasant righteousness, especially when the implicit subject is crossing a racial divide. And it was perhaps inevitable that “Daisy” should win the 1988 Pulitzer Prize for drama and become a 1989 movie that nabbed the Oscar for best picture.

Yet while Bruce Beresford’s film (which starred Jessica Tandy and Morgan Freeman) created an illusion of historic sweep and substance, the play is little more than a series of sketches with the gentle, laugh-a-little-cry-a-little rhythms of a sentimental sitcom. Its vignettes portray a classic clash of wills between an immovable object and an irresistible force that eventually melts into something like love.

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