NYT-1201: STATE OF THE ART A Thermostat That's Clever, Not ...

NYT-1204
A Second Arrival for 'Once' ... By PATRICK HEALY
The stars of the film "Once" and those of the stag
e musical discuss what is similar - and what is no
t - about the two versions.
===== notyet (2 pages)
WHILE preparing for the lead role of Girl in the n
ew Off Broadway musical “Once,” Cristin Milioti ma
de a choice common among performers in screen-to-s
tage adaptations: She avoided watching the origina
l film, a 2006 indie romance from Ireland that won
an Academy Award for the song “Falling Slowly.” H
er concern was that she might slip into mimicking
Marketa Irglova, the spirited young Czech musician
who became a fan favorite as Girl in the movie.
It turns out Ms. Milioti’s decision did not sit we
ll with Glen Hansard, who played Guy in the pictur
e. (Guy, Girl — get it?) He and Ms. Irglova fell i
n love while filming “Once,” a real-life consummat
ion of longings between their characters, two lost
souls wandering around Dublin and playing guitar
(him) and piano (her). They had since broken up, b
ut the 41-year-old Mr. Hansard felt protective of
Ms. Irglova, who is 18 years his junior. He though
t any other actress playing Girl needed to watch t
he genuine article.
“I wanted Cristin to know how good Mar is in the m
ovie,” Mr. Hansard recalled. “I had a hard time at
first with someone else playing Girl, because Gir
l to me was Mar.”
Mr. Hansard didn’t blink as he revealed these feel
ings last month at a table across from Ms. Milioti
, during an interview at an East Village brasserie
. Nor was she fazed. After more than a year of wor
kshops and out-of-town tryout performances, everyo
ne involved with “Once” has become reconciled to t
he complexities of art’s imitating life in the mus
ical, which opens Tuesday at New York Theater Work
shop.