The Lady in the Van

If every homeless person were as endearingly crotchety as Dame Maggie Smith in The Lady in the Van, we'd all let transients live in our driveways, chuckling at their passive kvetching while it rounds out our children's sense of humor.

This book-turned-award-winning play-turned-film is based on the true story of writer Alan Bennett allowing a homeless woman to live in his driveway for 15 years. After the novel, Bennett went on to write a West End play of the same name, starring Maggie Smith as the indomitable Miss Mary Shepherd, with Nicholas Hytner in the director's chair. The gang's all here for the big-screen adaptation.

Smith slides back into the titular role with practiced humor, going about her business with unfettered purpose. When Bennett runs into her selling loose pencils and advice on the sidewalk, she calmly explains, "I'm not a beggar, I'm self-employed."

There are actually two Bennetts—one is writing the story, the other is living it. With impressive use of green-screen magic, the two sit in the same room like a pair of identical twins and throw witty barbs at each other. Alex Jennings excels in his binary role as both Bennetts, using subtle changes in tone and posture to differentiate the two sides of a very moderately tempered, semicloseted gay man.

Hytner complements the playful screenplay without making a clown out of Miss Shepherd, employing a vibrant palette onscreen to keep the tone light. Shepherd's poorly painted yellow van with stuffed plastic bags spilling from all sides only makes the quaint Camden neighborhood look more charming, even if Miss Shepherd's main contribution to the community is bitter curses for children playing recorders nearby.

Despite this kid-friendly, Disney-style version of homelessness, Smith gives a genuine performance as a misunderstood woman suffering from PTSD, proudly grasping her grimy layers of clothing, and her opinions, with blunt conviction. Her tone is too confident for us to doubt her claims of past prestige—she very well could have been a nun, a concert pianist or an ambulance driver.

Critic's Grade: B+

see it: The Lady in the Van is rated PG-13. It opens Friday at Fox Tower.

Willamette Week