The Life of Reilly

There are some unhappy people who mistrust and dismiss rave reviews. Nothing, they say, can be that good, so it must be some self-indulgent exercise in gush. What follows, I beseech you to believe it, is the gospel truth—the gospel according to John, though Matthew, Mark and Luke would surely corroborate it.

I am ecstatic about The Life of Reilly, a documentary by Barry Poltermann and Frank Anderson, edited down to 87 minutes by Paul Linke and Charles Nelson Reilly from a three-hour autobiographical one-man show that Reilly used to perform across America to unanimous acclaim (well, with some clever additions that could only be done on film).

Charles Nelson Reilly (1931-2007) was a wonderful, campy comedian on stage, screen and TV, as well as a no less wonderful stand-up comic wherever there was a platform for him to stand on. He had, however, gotten old and retired. Poltermann & Co. got him to make one last appearance for their documentary—which, bless them and him, is more than just that, brilliantly shot from various angles and distances, with brief black-and-white archival footage illustratively inserted. There is, too, discreet incidental music by Anderson, conveying theatrical underscoring and bathing particularly touching scenes in a fetching afterglow.

We also get first-rate writing by Reilly. An amazing life, from Bronx poverty to Broadway dazzle, from hunger in Hartford to Hollywood abundance. Life provided the blueprint, but Reilly's literary artistry had to construct it into a fabulous narrative full of sharply observed detail, irresistible humor, unmilked melancholy and humanely observed humanity. Much of it is worthy of Balzac, Dickens or Mark Twain.

Further, this is a dazzling piece of stagecraft at the service of a magisterial performance. A good actor can make you laugh or cry, but it takes a great actor like Reilly to make you laugh and cry simultaneously—one who senses the humor in tragedy and the heartbreak in comedy and can unhistrionically convey them.

Forgive me if I offer no barrage of samples. Out of 2,620 seconds (every other one) of quotable moments, how dare you choose one and omit the next? And without riveting facial expressions, supremely rhetorical vocal emphases and Pinteresquely eloquent pauses, how impoverished even the best preview becomes.

[IMG:R]Nevertheless, against my better judgment, herewith a few choice bits. First, the marvelous device of conjuring up a humble personage by adducing a famous actor who could play him or her, with usually an inserted film clip of the actor. It begins with unassuming Dad, to be played by Hume Cronyn; and domineering Mom, to be played (ironically) by compassionate Shirley Booth. These castings become ever funnier—and more pointed—until we come to a handsome uncle for whom Burt Lancaster would be rejected for inferior looks. When, at a Hollywood party given by Hope Lange, Reilly tells the real Shirley Booth how he has cast her, and she firmly denies any similarity to the maternal termagant, he calls after her, "But what a great part for you!"

Or consider the evocation of a 2½-room Hartford apartment, whereto poverty confined seven people: Charles, Mom, Dad, Uncle Ben, Aunt Lilly and the still very Swedish maternal grandparents. Someone calls the sissyish Charles odd. "Imagine," he ruminates, "being the odd one in an Ingmar Bergman household."

Take the wonderful Tuesday 11 A.M. acting classes that Uta Hagen bestowed gratis on a class of 40 students who couldn't pay the nominal three bucks. As we read along the list of their names in Reilly's hand, there's not one that didn't became famous on stage, screen, TV or all three, gathering Oscars, Tonys and Emmys like pebbles on a beach. They had three things in common, Reilly muses: "We all loved theater, we all had no money, and none of us could act worth a shit."

And so we spectators shuttle between laughter and tears, with frequent stops for wonder at such good writing, such great acting and such sublime forgiveness for everyone—even a glowing tribute to that deleterious mother who nevertheless had her admirable side.

So trust me: The Life of Reilly is an unforgettable film version of a superlative stage show, starring a man whose artistry is matched only by his humanity. I left a screening with just one regret: that Reilly was no longer alive to read this and the undoubted host of similar tributes.