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Sharp film should adapt swimmingly to theatre
By Nick Curtis, Evening Standard 08.08.07
Swimming With Sharks was the springboard to Kevin Spacey's movie career
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With its pressure-cooker sense of enclosure, and action that takes place predominantly in two rooms, George Huang's 1994 film Swimming With Sharks is an ideal candidate for stage adaptation.
It will fit neatly into the compact Vaudeville Theatre, and there is even a sense of rightness about it coming to the stage. Huang's cynical, low-budget look at the underbelly of the film business was the springboard to Kevin Spacey's movie career. Until then primarily a stage actor, Spacey tore up the screen in his first leading film role as sadistic producer Buddy Ackerman.
The producer considers it his right, nay his obligation, to tread on as many little guys on the way up. Nobody today remembers writer-director Huang, or its co-star Frank Whaley: they remember Spacey's operatic, capricious, abusive rants as the boss from hell. That, and the scene where Buddy's assistant Guy (Whaley), turns on his boss, tying him to a chair and subjects him to some exquisitely nasty tortures. The thought of Tabasco sauce in a paper cut still has the power to make grown men wince.
Apart from Spacey's stand-out performance, the film is a cross between Nine To Five and The Player, only distinguished somewhat by its flashback structure. But it is a neat, sharp-witted tale which may blossom again on the London stage.
Reader views (3)
Honestly, I vividly remember Frank Whaley's work far more than Kevin Spacey's performance, in the film. Don't get me wrong, I think Spacey is wonderful in the film but Frank Whaley made the entire movie work in a way that no other actor could. It's a wonderful movie (thank you so much George Huang!) and I actually wish they were both actors were doing the play version!
- Lauren, New York
Yes, Spacey is terrific in that movie, but it's unfair to say that Whaley is forgotten. He's outstanding in the role of Guy. I think this actor is underrated and didn't have the career he rightly deserved.
- Zelda, Paris
It would be wonderful to see Swimming with Sharks on stage as it definitely would adapt really well to theater. The movie was lots of fun, Spacey was especially good, as was pointed out.
- Scarlett, US
