The utterly delightful "Every Little Step" (an exciting, moving
documentary about auditions for "A Chorus Line") will have its commercial
release in late April, but a similar documentary of outstanding merit
has no such assured future of being seen - yet. It should.  At a private
screening Friday at Dolby Laboratories, "They Came to Play" impressed
the viewer as a potential commercial crackerjack, and, alternatively,
PBS-worthy to a T.

The "They" of the title are 75 contestants accepted - from hundreds of
applicants - at the fifth International Piano Competition for Outstanding
Amateurs in Fort Worth, hosted by the Van Cliburn Foundation.  A more
motley crew you will never see, ranging from a Moldova-born dental
assistant in Oakland (with an overlarge Phyllis Diller personality) to
doctors, lawyers, a former coach of the French national tennis team, to
a man battling a fatal disease.

They are all amateurs - in the sense of not making a living from music
- and they all love music in palpable, moving, sometimes hilarious, often
dramatic ways.

In his directing debut, Alex Rotaru (a Romanian-born editor for BBC and
Screen Actors Guild Awards telecasts) follows a dozen contestants (some
making the finals, some not - it's great fun to root for your favorites)
from their homes through the contest.  Those homes range from Texas to
Berlin to the Bay Area; the contestants represent a cross-section of
humanity.

"They Came to Play" is a brilliant multiple character study, an in-depth
look at how music is made, and it provides generous excerpts from
fascinating performances.  It's amazing how much is squeezed into 90
minutes.

To state the obvious, this is not "the" Van Cliburn competition, but it
is run by the same foundation, and the man himself makes a few fleeting
appearances.  That's all to the good as Cliburn's habitually strange
behavior has reached something just plain weird.  With the mien of
an Old Testament figure (a la Charlton Heston), Cliburn makes terse,
incomprehensible pronouncements - but doesn't overstay his welcome.

As for the Players Who Came, their welcome could easily extend to twice
the length of the movie.

Janos Gereben
www.sfcv.org
[log in to unmask]

             ***********************************************
The CLASSICAL mailing list is powered by L-Soft's renowned LISTSERV(R)
list management software together with L-Soft's HDMail High Deliverability
Mailer for reliable, lightning fast mail delivery.  For more information,
go to:  http://www.lsoft.com/LISTSERV-powered.html