2006年VOA标准英语-Popular Radio Show Comes to the Big Screen in A

 By Alan Silverman
Hollywood
18 June 2006
 
  
  
A popular musical variety show on public radio in the United States is the inspiration for a gently funny new film directed by Robert Altman and written by the creator of the radio show, Garrison¹ Keillor.

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For more than 30 years, listeners tuned² in to hear guest stars join the regular cast for a potpourri³ of live music and homespun humor with a mid-western twang. This show is different, though. The radio station has been sold and the new owners are pulling the plug on A Prairie Home Companion.

Garrison Keillor writes and hosts the real public radio show and in his script for the film he gave A Prairie Home Companion a host known by the initials 'G.K.' "I just always assumed there would be an actor playing me. I had hoped there would be ... and then he just didn't show up," he said.

Garrison Keillor, Lily Tomlin, Meryl Streep and Lindsay Lohan in A Prairie Home Companion   
  
A stellar cast did show up, however, including Lily Tomlin and Meryl Streep as a country music sister act, Lindsay Lohan as Streep's morose⁴ teenage daughter and Kevin Kline as a rundown detective moonlighting as the show's security man. Much to Keillor's chagrin⁵, these actors would often improvise⁶ instead of just reading his script. "Here you are, you've spent weeks ... literally⁷ hundreds of hours ... working on this and they, just in a twinkling of an eye," he says, "feel that they can improve on this? Where does that come from?"

The screen comedy is directed by 81-year-old Robert Altman and radio man Keillor appreciates what the veteran filmmaker did. "Robert Altman's contribution to the movie is making it move," he says. "There is motion. Things happen. My contribution is that people say words. Those are mostly mine. Robert Altman is a movie guy. I am an essayist."

Comic actress Lily Tomlin is paired with Oscar-winner Meryl Streep, who says, "I just love to sing and never get the chance."

As the action moves between backstage and the on-air radio show, there is always music and Streep says that made this film fun for her. "The hardest thing to get over in movie-making is the stop-start-stop-start, going out to the Winnebago [trailer], coming back an hour later when the lights are set and beginning again [and] to reintegrate into the story and the world and to feel like, when people see it, that it all is a breathing entity⁸ [and] all makes sense. What this had was Rich Dworsky, this amazing musician, who has the band behind; and the music never, ever stopped. Even when the cameras were off, people would be noodling, somebody would go over, Kevin would sit down and play the piano, somebody would start singing a song ... and we never left the movie," she says.

Among the entertainers: rambunctious⁹ and ribald singing cowboys Dusty and Lefty played by screen veterans John C. Reilly and Woody Harrelson. "It's so funny because I always think to myself. 'Woody, you just have to not go over the line in terms of the scene.' You have to be true to the scene. I try to caution myself. Man, you check out Meryl Streep and Kevin Kline and Lily Tomlin. I was in a room with some scene-grabbers you would not believe," he says. "These are classic scene-stealers. They have every trick in the book. So I thought 'okay, I don't feel so bad now.'"

All the music in A Prairie Home Companion was performed for the cameras on the stage of the Fitzgerald Theater in Saint Paul, Minnesota - home base of the actual radio show. The film's cast also includes Tommy Lee Jones as the heartless corporate¹⁰ official; and Virginia Madsen plays a mysterious woman who lurks¹¹ backstage during the show.

1 garrison   

n.卫戍部队；驻地，卫戍区；vt.派(兵)驻防

参考例句：

• The troops came to the relief of the besieged garrison.军队来援救被围的守备军。
• The German was moving to stiffen up the garrison in Sicily.德军正在加强西西里守军之力量。

2 tuned   

adj.调谐的，已调谐的v.调音( tune的过去式和过去分词 )；调整；（给收音机、电视等）调谐；使协调

参考例句：

• The resort is tuned in to the tastes of young and old alike. 这个度假胜地适合各种口味，老少皆宜。
• The instruments should be tuned up before each performance. 每次演出开始前都应将乐器调好音。 来自《简明英汉词典》

3 potpourri   

n.混合之事物；百花香

参考例句：

• As tobacco cigarette burns,a potpourri of 4000 chemicals is released,including carbon monoxide and hydrocyanic acid.当烟被点燃时，融合了四千种化学品的气体被释放出来，其中包括一氧化碳和氢氰酸。
• Even so,there is a slight odour of potpourri emanating from Longfellow.纵然如此，也还是可以闻到来自朗费罗的一种轻微的杂烩的味道。

4 morose   

adj.脾气坏的，不高兴的

参考例句：

• He was silent and morose.他沉默寡言、郁郁寡欢。
• The publicity didn't make him morose or unhappy?公开以后，没有让他郁闷或者不开心吗？

5 chagrin   

n.懊恼；气愤；委屈

参考例句：

• His increasingly visible chagrin sets up a vicious circle.他的明显的不满引起了一种恶性循环。
• Much to his chagrin,he did not win the race.使他大为懊恼的是他赛跑没获胜。

6 improvise   

v.即兴创作；临时准备，临时凑成

参考例句：

• If an actor forgets his words，he has to improvise.演员要是忘记台词，那就只好即兴现编。
• As we've not got the proper materials,we'll just have to improvise.我们没有弄到合适的材料，只好临时凑合了。

7 literally   

adv.照字面意义，逐字地；确实

参考例句：

• He translated the passage literally.他逐字逐句地翻译这段文字。
• Sometimes she would not sit down till she was literally faint.有时候，她不走到真正要昏厥了，决不肯坐下来。

8 entity   

n.实体，独立存在体，实际存在物

参考例句：

• The country is no longer one political entity.这个国家不再是一个统一的政治实体了。
• As a separate legal entity,the corporation must pay taxes.作为一个独立的法律实体，公司必须纳税。

9 rambunctious   

adj.喧闹的；粗鲁的

参考例句：

• Their rambunctious son always got into trouble.他们那个不受管束的儿子老是惹麻烦。
• It's not the chirping,rambunctious play that they did when they first arrived.他们现在已经不像刚开始见面那会儿，总是冲着对方乱叫，或者在玩耍时动作粗暴。

10 corporate   

adj.共同的，全体的；公司的，企业的

参考例句：

• This is our corporate responsibility.这是我们共同的责任。
• His corporate's life will be as short as a rabbit's tail.他的公司的寿命是兔子尾巴长不了。

11 lurks   

n.潜在，潜伏；（lurk的复数形式）vi.潜伏，埋伏（lurk的第三人称单数形式）

参考例句：

• Behind his cool exterior lurks a reckless and frustrated person. 在冷酷的外表背后，他是一个鲁莽又不得志的人。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• Good fortune lies within Bad, Bad fortune lurks within good. 福兮祸所倚，祸兮福所伏。 来自互联网