A little Body Heat is being applied to Cat on a Hot Tin Roof these days in the shapely, silk-slipped form of Kathleen Turner, hiking the theatre temperature appreciably. She turned instant star her first time on film 鈥� as the tragically literal femme fatale of the 1981鈥檚 Body Heat 鈥� and she has been circling for a Broadway opening ever since. It actually comes to pass this month when Turner stars, in her glamorous and predatory fashion, as Maggie the Cat, prowling through Tennessee William鈥檚 1955 Pulitzer Prize鈥搘inner about Southern-fried avarice and mendacity.
鈥淚t鈥檚 a great role, period,鈥� Turner declares with emphatic enthusiasm. 鈥淚鈥檝e been thinking about doing Maggie for a long time 鈥� for years, I think. I like her spirit, her indomitability. She鈥檚 very, very brave, and she doesn鈥檛 ever really give up. It鈥檚 the sort of role where an actress picks up the script and goes, 鈥極h, wow, I talk for 50 minutes.鈥� and then gets on stage and goes, 鈥極h God, I talk for 50 minutes.鈥� 鈥� Indeed, as the playwright has drawn the battle lines, Maggie is the dominant force in the first and third acts; the middle act is the exclusive arena of her father-in-law, Big Daddy Pollitt, a Mississippi millionaire dying of cancer trying to set his disheveled household in order. As performed here, this boils down to something of a dramatic relay race for Turner and Charles Durning. 鈥淚t鈥檚 a passing off, back and forth, 鈥� she concedes, 鈥淪ometimes, when Charles comes off the second act, he says, 鈥楾op that, honey!鈥� 鈥�
Certainly, there鈥檚 conflict aplenty in the piece. Big Daddy鈥檚 eminent demise has prompted a mad scramble for his wealth. His first born, Gooper, and wife Mae and their pint-sized posse of 鈥渘o-neck monsters鈥� have taken the lead, if not the whole field, since brother Brick prefers to sit out the race 鈥� as well as his sexless marriage to Maggie 鈥� retreating into booze while he grieves over the death of a football buddy (a probable suicide and possible homosexual). To protect her turf and inheritance, Maggie fabricates the lie that she鈥檚 with child 鈥� and then prevails on Brock to make an honest woman of her. Whew!
Barry and Fran Weissler assembled a powerhouse supporting cast from every medium imaginable: Turner and Durning are the feature-film contingent; their Brick hails from the recent Broadway revival of Born Yesterday, Daniel Hugh Kelly; Big Mama is TV鈥檚 Flo, Polly Holliday; and the rest are Off-Broadway reliables 鈥� Ray Gill as Gooper, Debra Jo Rupp as Mae/Sister Woman, Nesbitt Blaisdell as Reverend Tooker, and Jerome Dempsey as Doctor Baugh. Completing the eclectic mix is a director from the Royal Shakespeare Company, Howard Davies, who brought Les Liaisons Dangereuses to Broadway and staged a London edition of Cat on a Hot Tin Roof.
It was the Weisslers who suggested Davies, and Turner quickly concurred 鈥� on the basis of a little pop quiz: 鈥淚 said, 鈥楬ow many laughs in the first act?鈥� He said, 鈥極h, so many.鈥� I said, 鈥楪ood.鈥� It was always my intention to make the play funnier than the public impression of it. I think people come in expecting a lot of suffering. But, if you look at the lines, it鈥檚 hard to imagine Tennessee didn鈥檛 intend those laughs. I mean, the third act is a farce, with Gooper and Mae telling Big Mama that Bid Daddy鈥檚 dying 鈥� 鈥楬e鈥檚 turning yellow, Mama' 鈥� or them saying at once, 鈥楴ow, Big Mama, you had to know,鈥� He specifically states they say that line in unison. Personally, I always thought Maggie was really quite an entertainer whoever was in the room. I think Tennessee would have liked the amount of humor we鈥檝e kept.鈥�
Jessica Lange, who played Maggie in a television adaptation, has said that sexiness is not something one acts, but Turner begs to differ 鈥� particularly in respect to this work. 鈥淚f that鈥檚 an element of the character in the play, I don鈥檛 see why you can鈥檛 act it. In fact, I don鈥檛 see why you can鈥檛 act almost anything except self-pity. You can鈥檛 act that interestingly, I don鈥檛 think. But it鈥檚 certain that Tennessee鈥檚 intention that Maggie wants this man very, very much. Just look at the way he sets it up: These two people come onstage. This woman takes off her dress. The guy comes out in a towel. And then you find out they haven鈥檛 touched each other in ages. If you feel a real pull there, you鈥檝e got to believe these two had an extraordinary relationship at one time and really should be together, and they鈥檙e denying 鈥� or certainly, Brick鈥檚 denying 鈥� the attraction. When she finally gets to touch him at the end of the play, it鈥檚 such a release.鈥�
The homosexual relationship that may or may not have existed between Brick and his football friend is frustratingly undefined 鈥� but then that element usually was in 50鈥檚 plays 鈥� and for this reason no attempt has been made to move the story into modern times. 鈥� We had to keep an aura of the period because of Maggie鈥檚 options. The social shame of the marriage breaking up was enough to keep her in her place back then, but now it鈥檚 silly. Now, she would just leave him if the homosexuality were real 鈥� or, at least she would have that option.鈥� Ironically, in her only other brush with Broadway (replacing Carol Potter as Judith in Albert Innaurato鈥檚 Gemini), Turner tended over another impotent male. 鈥淕od, I hope this doesn鈥檛 become my stage signature,鈥� she laughs, adding a honkytonk postscript a la Mae West: 鈥淟emme set ya straight, honey.鈥�
Nine years have passed since Turner鈥檚 movie debut in Body Heat. In the interim she has solidified her standing with a string of hit flicks (Prizzi鈥檚 Honor, Peggy Sue Got Married, Romancing the Stone, The Jewel of the Nile, and most recently, The War of the Roses), all the while trying to get back to Broadway.
鈥淚 just love doing stage work. I love having people there and getting an immediate response and not having someone around yelling 鈥楥ut.鈥� This is an old dream of mine 鈥� the whole business: going out of town for tryouts and coming in with it. It鈥檚 what I always thought I鈥檇 be doing 鈥� until movies got in the way.鈥�
