As far as
Buster’s works go, this is one of the more unique entries: a straight dramatic role, in this one-off TV
adaptation of Nikolai Gogol’s “The Overcoat” (in the introductory remarks, host
Douglas Fairbanks refers to it as “The Cloak,” so, until I heard Buster’s
repeated mentions of his overcoat, I didn’t make the connection with the Gogol
story they keep talking about in The
Namesake.) As a venture, I wouldn’t
say it’s entirely successful, but it is interesting to see.
In a
nonspecified autocratic society (everyone refers to the “Chief,” a nameless
dictator, and exactly one character uses an eastern European accent – while the
details are lightly-drawn, the desired takeaway is clear,) Buster plays a
dedicated government clerk. He works in
the Department of Records, where he fastidiously but unsympathetically
catalogues the applied-for wants of his fellow citizens. He himself has little to yearn for until his
tailor, declaring his threadbare overcoat beyond repair, tempts him with the
prospect of a new one. The clerk saves
scrupulously, denying himself every small pleasure to get the coat, but
although it’s every bit as wonderful as he’d hoped, he soon gets more than he
bargained for.
It’s
quite a serviceable dystopian story.
Given the time in which it was made, the anti-Communist allusions are
pretty strong, and the overcoat provides an interesting vantage point for the
clerk to be “awakened” to what his society is really about. His transformation over the course of the
piece seems fairly reasonable, and I like the idea of such a seemingly-small
thing (although the overcoat is no small matter to him) being the catalyst for
really dramatic changes in a man.
Overall, I’d say it’s decently made but not especially noteworthy.
Naturally,
the big point of interest here is seeing Buster in a dramatic role (which
Fairbanks highlights in his introduction.)
Now, it isn’t the only place to see Buster in a more serious part – the
present-day stuff in “The Silent Partner” is played mostly straight, and that
Christmas special he did for The Donna Reed Show really focuses on the sentimentality. And really, even Buster’s silent stuff have
little dramatic moments here and there.
However, I’d say most of those examples tend more toward “touching,”
while “The Awakening” is more of an earnest drama.
And how
does Buster do in a drama? Well… To be
honest, it’s a little hard for me to say.
Buster can’t rely on the usual tricks comedic actors use nowadays to
make the switch to dramatic acting, because his comedic persona is already so
low-key and stone-faced. As such, there’s
not a noticeably-large difference between how “comedy Buster” and “drama
Buster” act, just a major lack of slapstick.
I can’t tell to what extent I’m not quite sold on this because I know
it’s Buster and he still seems a lot like Buster – if I didn’t know who he was,
for instance, and I watched this in a college literature class or something,
what would I make of the central performance?
I don’t know. I can say that I
think Buster handles the climax, the scene with the Chief, very well. There’s some intensity there, and it’s the
scene where I’m most able to disassociate the character from Buster himself.
Warnings
Thematic
elements and implied violence.
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