Roberts' stage debut fails to deceive
Roberts' stage debut fails to deceive
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Friday, 21, Apr 2006 11:38
Julia Roberts, once the best-paid actress in the film industry, has had her acting frailty well and truly exposed during her debut appearance on the stage.
The Hollywood stalwart is appearing on Broadway for the first time in Joe Mantello's production of Three Days Of Rain alongside co-stars Raul Rudd and Bradley Cooper.
But critics have panned her opening display, in which Roberts, 38, plays Rudd's character's sister, Nan, and then the character's mother, Lina.
The New York Times described her performances as "stiff with self-consciousness, only glancingly acquainted with the two characters she plays. Her voice is strangled, abrupt and often hard to hear. She has the tenseness of a woman who might break into pieces at any second."
These sentiments were echoed by the The New York Sun which said: "Ms Roberts's Nan may have been awkward, but her Lina borders on embarrassing."
The New York Daily News claims she showed "little stage presence" and The Washington Post remarked "Roberts looks ill at ease".