LIFE STORIES Charles Nelson Reilly's one-man stage show is candid in parts, but skimps on parts of The Life of Reilly audiences are likely most…
Image credit: Joe Piccolo
LIFE STORIES Charles Nelson Reilly's one-man stage show is candid in parts, but skimps on parts of The Life of Reilly audiences are likely most curious about
Movie Review

The Life of Reilly

In The Life of Reilly, his autobiographical one-man stage show, Charles Nelson Reilly still speaks with that patented game-show-queen lisp, only now he's spitting fire — he's like Sylvester the Cat in the body of Livia Soprano. Reilly, in his 70s, takes us through his hilariously awful childhood: Eugene O'Neill as toxic high camp. Yet he's far more candid recalling his grand delusions in a school play (''I sounded like Meryl Streep watching the rushes of Sophie's Choice!'') than he is when he gets to Broadway and Hollywood, where his memories — of Match Game, of being gay in a straight world — are disappointingly sketchy. B-

Originally posted Dec 05, 2007 Published in issue #969 Dec 14, 2007 Order article reprints

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