Some today mourn the loss of the musical-variety shows, which used to dominate the television landscape years ago. I miss the theatrical plays, like "Playhouse 90" and "American Playhouse." Keanu made his own contribution to this all-but-dead art form on TV when he starred in "Life Under Water," a 90 minute installment in the American Playhouse series on PBS, broadcast in April, 1989. It was his chance to break away from his recent spate of teen movie roles, and an opportunity to tap into his love of theater- for television. "LIfe Under Water" was adapted to the screen from its stage version by its original playwright, Richard Greenberg.
It is very difficult for fans to find copies, let alone a good one (my picture jumps up and down constantly). But if you can find one, it's well worth it, regardless of its condition. It stands apart from anything I have seen Keanu do and its unlike any television drama I've seen, with its slow pace, cerebral plot, nudity, and the feel of a live-stage production, albeit on the beach. So what's it about? According to Keanu, it's pretty simple: "One night my mother grounds me. I get drunk and go walking on the beach and fall in front of two girls, we make love, and then 'The future', and then I bail and I get driven home by my mom. It's a comedy." No one I know thinks its a comedy, although it does have some funny lines (Keanu, who plays Kip, says to Sarah, who plays Amy, "there's lots of terrible people on the streets of Manhattan- muggers, rapists, mimes.")
The play follows five bored wealthy people vacationing in the Hamptons. It was filmed during the last weeks of summer in 1988 when Keanu was still 23 years old, but only by a few weeks.
Many critics thought the play's transition to television was not a good one. Sheila Johnston, Keanu biographer, suggested that on stage the "speeches and behaviors might have seemed convincing, but looked forced and artificial on television." Some critics used words and phrases like "heavy" and "melancholy", "wordy teeth gnashing," and "long tortured monologues" to show their displeasure. The L.A. Times said the "production is soporific and the privileged characters are self-absorbed and unsympathetic." But some thought it was "unusually sharp television" (N.Y. Times) and according to Newsday, filled with "witty and snotty conversation." The executive director of American Playhouse, Lindsay Law, compared Keanu's character to "Catcher in the Rye" character Holden Caulfield. According to Law, Kip is 22 years old and stuck in a "one-parent household, with the parent as lost as he is." Sheila Johnston concluded that "Keanu did his best with the character, displaying the rare quality of being able to listen convincingly...and carrying off several long scenes on his own. Many, I might add, in beautiful close-ups.
"Life Under Water" has two storylines: Kip and the two women, Amy Joy and Amy Beth (I'm not making this up- it sounds like a porno flick), and Kip's mom's affair with a married man. It explores several themes: commitment vs. casual sex (commitment loses), manipulation vs. intimacy (intimacy loses), self-absorption vs. empathy (empathy loses.) Sound like a comedy? If this is what its like being rich and thin, I don't want to go there. The play has some parallels to Keanu's early film work: absentee fathers (Kip's dad just ran off with a 23 year old woman), strong dominating women (Kip's submissive interaction with the three women), and aliennated youth (Kip's drifting aimlessly through life with very poor social relationships). The play takes aim at our obsession over the cult of the "body beautiful" (the more beautiful Amy and the mother's physically fit lover are the most insincere and manipulative), and the cult of the
"celebrity" (lives devoid of intimate contact, save for an occasional sexual encounter.) Its established early on that Kip lies frequently and is often insincere ("Have I offended you? I don't mean to offend you" Kip says, without feeling, to his mother.) He meets his match with the beautiful Amy, when he chooses her over the more sympathetic Amy, in a startling, but brief, scene of nudity (front and back)...and I am not talking female here!
"Life Under Water" is not a happy time, but it made me appreciate and reflect on my life. I don't vacation in the Hamptons and I am certainly happier than the people in this film. The closing scene is Kip and his mother sitting on their front porch in front of the ocean in what appears to be the only open and honest encounter in their lives. Perhaps there is hope for the rich, and for the rest of us as we try to live our lives....above the water.
The balcony is now open.
[thank you to the POTD cluband Keanuland for pictures--krix]
UPDATE: Thanks to Keanuette of Keanua-z.com for the news that Life Under Water is being re-issued on VHS in August and can be ordered HERE.