ABSTRACT
I shall now address Ben Brantley, the chief drama critic of the New York Times, personally. This would be a good moment for the rest of my devoted readers to put on the kettle and make a nice cuppa tea. We wont be long.
Dear Ben,
I see you enjoyed My Night with Reg, Kevin Elyot’s British comedy about six homosexuals living in London. Perhaps it’s as good as you say, though the play wasn’t for me. I found it all very familiar indeed, a Boys in the Band for the less defensive nineties, with the usual gay stereotypes and melodramas of second-rate plays. But I do not think, if I may say so, that the size of Maxwell Caulfield’s penis is a decisive factor.
“Well,” you begin your June 13 review, a little breathlessly, “at least one man on the threshold of middle age has nothing to worry about when he puts on a swimsuit this summer.”
We’re very relieved to hear it. But must we? Then you go on to point out that the “impeccably proportioned torso” of the naked Mr. Caulfield, the actor you admired when he played the naked Adonis on the beach in Louise Page’s Salonika in 1985, is “once again on unabashed display (every inch of him) in My Night with Reg.”
And now you’ve gone too far even for me. I regret that I’m unfamiliar with Mr. Caulfield’s memorable performance as the naked Adonis in Salonika. I have seen him in Grease 2 and An Inspector Calls. He was good, though fully dressed. Ben, take my advice, old cockie: You don’t want to be known as the critic who writes his reviews with a tape measure. Stop it immediately. Let the impeccably proportioned torso that’s once again on unabashed display in My Night with Reg (every inch, ho, ho) speak for itself.
It isn’t cool to drool. We are more interested in the acting of the good Mr. Caulfield, who I hear has nothing to worry about when he puts on a swimsuit this summer. But there’s more: “The flesh of Mr. Caulfield, at least,” you continue, “still provides no evidence of a paunch or, despite a catty comment directed at his character, a drooping posterior.”
We’re very relieved to hear that, too. But I gotta get on with my own review now, Ben. Enjoy the summer.
