Behind the Slate: Opening Night

Name: Behind the Slate: Opening Night
Genre: Drama | USA
Released: 2025-11-13
Duration: 2 h 24 min
Cast: Gena Rowlands, John Cassavetes, Ben Gazzara

A live film-history podcast at The Plaza! The classic film followed by a brief Q&A. In a role equally as fragile and mercurial as A WOMAN UNDER THE INFLUENCE’s “Mabel”, Gena Rowlands is OPENING NIGHT’s “Myrtle”: a successful actress going kind of crazy in a play about aging crazily. John Cassavetes’ hymn to that berserk business of performing, OPENING NIGHT is enhanced by its intense “old Hollywood” pedigree as Ben Gazzara, John Blondell, Paul Stewart and Cassavetes himself are the backing band for Rowlands’ knife-edged soloing. From the first scene, the narrative is peppered with turn-on-a-dime ambiguity. Whole swathes of action take place “onstage” in front of a real-life audience watching the in-character cast — with a permeable membrane between stage and “reality” so tangible it hurts.Drama | USAPT2H24MPG-132025-11-13

Gena Rowlands

John Cassavetes

Ben Gazzara

John Cassavetes

Michael Lally

Behind the Slate: Opening Night"Behind the Slate: Opening Night"

Showtimes

November 13, 7:30 pm