"Albert Nobbs," nominated for three Academy Awards including Best Actress for Glenn Close, is the next featured film in the 1891 Fredonia Opera House Cinema Series. It will be screened on Saturday at 8 p.m. and Tuesday, April 24, at 7:30 p.m.
In "Albert Nobbs," five-time Academy Award nominee Close plays a woman passing as a man in order to work and survive in 19th century Ireland. Some 30 years after donning men's clothing, she finds herself trapped in a prison of her own making as a new love threatens to destroy everything she's worked so hard to create. Mia Wasikowska, Aaron Johnson and Brendan Gleeson join a prestigious, international cast that also includes Jonathan Rhys Meyers, Brenda Fricker, Pauline Collins and Best Supporting Actress Academy Award nominee Janet McTeer.
Close's connection to the character of Albert Nobbs stretches back almost three decades to her 1982 performance in Simone Benmussa's theatrical interpretation of the short story, "Albert Nobbs," by 19th century Irish author George Moore. "I think that Albert is one of the truly great characters; and the story, for all its basic simplicity, has a strange emotional power," says Close, whose turn in the Off-Broadway production prompted rave reviews and garnered the actress an Obie Award.
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Tom Long, in the Detroit News, calls the film "a film of great texture and tenderness; and the actors are a joy to behold." Colin Covert, in the Minneapolis Star Tribune, calls it "a costume drama where the costume is the drama." Ann Hornaday, in the Washington Post, says the film "sneaks up on the audience with the quiet discretion of the enigmatic protagonist at its center. And, like him, it contains multitudes beneath its prim surface." A.O. Scott, in the New York Times, says "Ms. McTeer's sly, exuberant performance is a pure delight, and the counterpoint between her physical expressiveness and Ms. Close's tightly coiled reserve is a marvel to behold." Rated R for some sexuality, brief nudity and language, "Albert Nobbs" runs 113 minutes.
Tickets to the Opera House Cinema Series are available at the door for $7 (adults), $6.50 (seniors & Opera House members) and $5 (students) the night of each screening. For more information, call the Opera House Box Office at 679-1891. The series continues with the frightening action thriller, "The Grey," on April 28 and May 1; the Paul Rudd-Jennifer Aniston comedy, "Wanderlust," on May 12 and 15; and the German documentary "The Silence Before Bach," on June 2.
Chautauqua County's only performing arts center presenting its own programming year-round, the 1891 Fredonia Opera House is a member-supported not-for-profit organization located in Village Hall in downtown Fredonia. For a complete schedule of events, visit www.fredopera.org.
