ARTS The Michigan Daily Sunday, November 4, 1984 Page 5 Caesar reigns in Soldier's Story 'A Soldier's Story' deals with the murder of a black sergeant in an all-black army barracks during World War II. Soler's Story misses Daily associate arts editor, Byron Bull, was able to catch up with actor Adolph Caesar for a very brief phone interview. Caesar portrays Sgt. Waters in the recently released film, A Soldier's Story. His character is the heart of the drama, a manical, self- tormented drill sergeant whose vicious, tyranical treatment of his troops leads to cold blooded murder. D: Even though Howard Rollins has the lead role, it's your Sgt. Waters who is actually the focus of the movie, the one whose death and reasons for it are the object of Rollins's Captain Daven- port's investigation. Do you see Sgt. Waters in this sense as a tragic charac- ter? C: I do. I see him very much as the classic definition of a tragic figure because his demise is brought about by a noble trait, his attempt to elevate his people, and eradicate the negative/stereotypical image of the black man. He wanted to improve the fighting ability of the black soldier, and thereby create a better image, and more respect. But it's his dogmatic determination to achieve that objective that causes him to be misunderstood, and leads to his being bumped off. D: What did you draw on to create the character? C: Well, I spent five years in the navy, so I'm well acquainted with the military mentality. D: Did you encounter much racism there yourself? C: No, not as much as Water's would in his time, but I can say that I've had a few experiences of my own that in ef- fect helped me to gain a better insight into the character. D: How closely did you work with writer Charles Fuller? C: Well, when we first received Mr. Fuller's play it required few changes, and he did sit in on rehearsals. It's very seldom that an actor and a writer communicate. D: What did Norman Jewison, who directed the film, bring to the project? C: He brought his wisdom and maturity, he stayed as close to the essence of the story and didn't interfere such that you could see the directors hand in it. There was very little attempt made to Hollywoodize it. He also had the infinite wisdom to permit the actors the freedom to find their roles. Overall it was quite a co-operative venture. D: Whose idea was it to change the ending of the story from the play's tragic ending where all of the men in the company go off to Europe and are killed, to the film's, where they are shown simply marching happily off into battle, on a highly patriotic note. C: That was an agreement between Mr. Jewison and Mr. Fuller, because they wanted to enforce the theme that these men looked forward to fighting as a release of their pent up tensions, and also because they wanted a forties genre style ending. And after all the co- operation we'd received from the army, we didn't want to make that kind of a negative statement... D: Do you find theatre more challenging than film? C: Well, there's no immediate UNION Ground Floor :mark in screen *By Byron Bull A Soldier's Story is a fairly straight- forward film adaptation of Charles Fuller's acclaimed 1982 stagework, "A Soldier's Play," about the murder of a 4 black sergeant in an all-black army barracks during World War Two. While it's refreshing to see a large ensemble .,of black actors working together on film (and much of the cast is excellent) veteran director Norman Jewison' s tepid direction never gives the film the momentum and power to be very affec- ting. The story takes place in the racially segregated army of the forties, is set in the deep south, and though it talks a lot f ,,about racism, is really primarily a murder mystery. The lead character, Captain Daven- port (Howard E. Rollins, Jr.) sent down from Washington to investigate the case, essentially fills the role of any detective in a mystery as the anchor which all of the suspects are tied to, and the lens that the author uses to fix on, and magnify, each of them. Davenport himself really has little to do with the focus of the film, and for all his screen time is never explored in much depth. The men of the barracks that Daven- port interogates represent a wide spec- trum of young blacks of varying degrees of education and intelligence, and come from all corners of the coun- try. They share many of the same frustrations, and despite their desparate personalities, are drawn together into a certain brotherly comradery. They are continually houn- ded and haranged by their relentless drill sergeant, a self-loathing, bitter man whose inability to find acceptance in white society has driven him to an obsessive desire to purge his troops of any distinctly black traits and to homogenize them into a new breed of black that white society will accept. Almost every man in the company has suffered abuse at the hands of Waters, and each, though the murder has been attributed to the local KKK, harbors enough personal resentment to make them suspects. Fuller's script, adapted from his original for the stage, examines each of the men in the barracks with a fascinating wealth of insight and detail, down to their regional dialects and mannerisms. The structure of the narrative, though, with heavy use of flashbacks, is so encumbered by technique that often it overshadows the story itself, and drains it of much of its inherent power. The character of Davenport, who at the films outset seems to be the prin- cipal interest, is an element that Fuller doesn't quite know what to do with. He spends a lot of time with hime at the outset, showing him running up against opposition from the white commanders of the company, who'd just as soon write the whole incident off. He also ahs to cope with the men in the barracks who see this polished, Howard Univer- sity-trained lawyer in a reverent light, and can't believe that he'd conceive of another black man being the murderer. Once the interogations gets under way, Fuller pulls away from Davenport, and focuses on Waters, going back only out of necessity when he has to move the story forward. By the films first ten minutes, he's become just an author's device. It's no surprise that director Norman Jewison was drawn to the material, as it bares certain surface similarities to his 1967 In The Heat Of The Night, in which Sidney Poitier played a black detective investigating a murder in the south. Jewison certainly put his heart in the project, going so far as to even pass up a salary to keep the film's budget down. But despite his respect for the material, he miscalculates on bringing it to the screen.The final film is often diffuse, inconsistent in tone and topic, and never makes the full evolution from play into film. It seems stuck halfway, like a mediocre television adaptation. The film is quite sterile, textureless, and unstyled that it's virtually un- cinematic for the most part. Jewison puts his actors in front of barren, starkly lit sets that feel as if no one ever inhabited them, and shoots them delivering their dialogues with a mostly static flatness. Some scenes, namely those with the men in the barracks, seem poorly rehearsed, as each extra delivers his one or two lines on cue with an unnatural stiffness. The few attempts to lend the proceedings a cinematic vantage point response from the audience when you shoot a film, but in the theater you have to maintain an energy in the perfor- mance that runs from start to finish. In film, you have to learn infinital patien- ce, and how to maintain an energy level even when you're shooting out of sequence. D: What have you learned from film that you can take back to the theatre? C: Subtlety, and because the camera's blocked off you have to be very, almost purposeful in your movements. D: Did you ever feel restrained by the technical limitations? C: As a matter of fact I felt it quite a challenge. rersion are pretty lame. He moves some of the scenes outside (but these scenes are just filler anyway) and at the film's climax, throws in an unnecessary chase scene that's visual in the crudest of terms, set during a thunderstorm with plenty of rain and lightning and Herbie Hancock's pounding incongruously modern pop jazz score. For the most part the action, the revelations of the films characters, the sudden, not very surprising twist of plot, unfold in a straightforward, un- conventional manner. The ending in particular is unsatisfying in its dishonest, tritely optimistic tone. Jewison does deserve credit for keeping the film on a lowburn, and for not trying to overplay the script by propelling it with cheap "powerhouse" dramatics, but he still never breathes as much life into the material as it could sustain. None of which should dissuade one from catching this film for the pleasure of viewing some fine actors who are too infrequently given this kind of ex- posure. Howard Rollins, though already showered with excessive praise, is quite honestly one of the most exciting actors to be in films today, and he's only had two feature roles to date. Rollins has a vitality, a penetrating conviction to his every line and move that only the most absorbed actors can exude. Just standing still, in his perfec- tly fitting, pressed tan uniform, his eyes shielded behind dark stained MacAr- thur style sunglasses, he has an eye drawing presence. With his glasses off, and in action, he's a passionate, vividly expressive artist who can draw out every physical nuance possible, and never seem excessive. Just as his showpiece (even if his role doesn't do him justice), A Soldier's Story is worth one's time. The fact that it's so modestly mounted and unpatronizing a film, when the big hype and marketing monstrosities of the Christmas season only a month away, is another ap- pealing fact to consider. 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