The director of the new revival of Andrew Lloyd Webber’s “Sunset Blvd.” takes the final line from Billy Wilder’s noir classic – “I’m ready for my close-up!” – and repeats it ad nauseam. The line is spoken only once on stage, at the end. But from the opening of Jamie Lloyd’s ridiculously foggy and overwrought production, this director gives us close-ups not only of all the principal actors, but every chorister as well.
Putting a video camera(s) on stage and having live actors taped so that their faces can be magnified on big screens has become the most tiresome directorial crutch of this century.