Reading "All My Sons"

Somehow, through my four years in high school and first three years of college, I missed -- for the most part -- the Arthur Miller boat. Besides for a few lessons on The Crucible, which I enjoyed at the time but which left little mark on my psyche, most of what I knew of Arthur Miller was the titles of his plays -- The Man Who Had All the Luck, All My Sons, After the Fall, A View From the Bridge, Death of a Salesman...

He'll probably come up in my History of Drama and Theatre II class next semester, but I'm not one to wait around to be taught about something; I like to go out and teach myself whenever possible. So with this aim in mind -- to familiarize myself with All My Sons in advance of the Broadway revival's opening -- I bought Arthur Miller: Collected Plays (1944-1961) with my Barnes and Noble membership discount and sat down to read the play.

Oh. My. God. Arthur Miller is a genius. What a compelling topic -- residual scandal over the blunders of an unlikely war profiteer! Mixed with all kinds of family intrigue! And some of the best goddamn dialogue I've ever read for the theatre. It's been a while since I read a play that was such a page-turner. It reminded me a bit of Shaw's Major Barbara and a little bit of O'Neill, only combining the best elements of each to make for a real theatrical home run.

If Katie Holmes can pull of the plum role of Ann, the rest of the cast seems absolutely spot-on. I say, be there or be square!

"Equus" -- a season of play revivals!

With the Broadway run of Equus opening Thursday, I'm struck by the number of play revivals we'll be seeing on Broadway this fall.

I count the following: Arthur Miller's All My Sons, David Mamet's American Buffalo and Speed-the-Plow, Peter Shaffer's Equus, Anton Chekhov's The Seagull, and Robert Bolt's A Man For All Seasons.

In winter and spring, those will be supplemented by Henrik Ibsen's Hedda Gabler and Friedrich von Schiller's Mary Stuart.

If last season was the season for musical revivals, with Gypsy, Sunday in the Park with George, and South Pacific each earning rave reviews and multiple Tony nominations, this seems to be the year producers are hoping to bank on audiences' familiarity with classic plays and penchant for star turns. Among those starring in play revivals are: Daniel Radcliffe and Richard Griffiths (Equus); John Lithgow, Dianne Wiest, Katie Holmes, and Patrick Wilson (All My Sons); Cedric the Entertainer, John Leguizamo, and Haley Joel Osment (American Buffalo); Jeremy Piven and Raul Esparza (Speed-the-Plow); Kristin Scott Thomas (The Seagull); and Frank Langella (A Man For All Seasons). Looking ahead, Mary Louise Parker's turn in Hedda Gabler looks particularly poised to create some buzz as well.

At the moment, as its opening night fast approaches, all eyes are turned to Equus. Is Daniel Radcliffe's penis worth paying $120 for? Is he a better actor on stage than he is in the middling Harry Potter adaptations? And how is Radcliffe's costar Richard Griffiths, making his first return to Broadway since his Tony-winning turn in The History Boys? The answers are all forthcoming in my review of the play, but I suspect that a visit of one's own will ultimately be the only way to assuage one's curiosity.

"Mourning Becomes Electra"

I just this moment finished reading Eugene O'Neill's Mourning Becomes Electra. In my history of drama and theatre course, as we were reading Aeschylus's The Oresteia, my professor mentioned this play as a reinterpretation of Aeschylus worth noting. In the play, O'Neill updates Aeschylus, setting the events in post-Civil War New England.

Now that I've read it, I'm not sure what to think. It's a brilliant exercise in updating an ancient play for modern times, but I'm fast realizing O'Neill's flaws as a dramatic writer. The conceit of the play, the resemblance amongst characters within the Mannon family, relies on heavy amounts of stage direction. This would be totally intolerable to literary departments accepting scripts nowadays and has the averse affect of spelling out too much for a reader.

The speechifying is overwrought; the dialogue is too often either too pedestrian or too erudite. That said, the character of Christine Mannon (the Clytaemnestra character) is fascinating.

All in all, an interesting, flawed read. Apparently it's being revived off-Broadway this season. It'll be interesting to see if they can wade through the muck of O'Neill's melodrama and make this a compelling production.

And another play from the same book (Three Plays) is being revived on Broadway this season with Carla Gugino, Pablo Schreiber, and Brian Dennehy: Desire Under the Elms (awful title, no?)

New York theatre...

I'd like to start writing on this blog again. There was a time I wrote it in almost nonstop, but recently I've been much busier. Whilst in London, I was running about like a chicken with its head cut off, flitting from one theatre to the next. Now, in New York, I'm balancing classes with my internship at Roundabout Theatre Company and the steady stream of reviews I've been writing for musicOMH.com (my favorite of my obligations).

No matter, I'm determined that I will post here as often as I can. Because I'll be posting most of my lengthy thoughts about productions on musicOMH.com, I'll refrain from detailed reviews on here. Instead, I'll add little tidbits, recommend little things I've stumbled upon, etc. Most of it will be theatre-related; some of it will not be.

First up, as I was wandering through the BC/EFA Broadway Flea Market this year, I stumbled upon a recording done by Corin Redgrave of Oscar Wilde's De Profundis for $5. I read this book over the summer, an extended letter written by Wilde to his lover Lord Alfred "Bosie" Douglas during his term of imprisonment at Reading Gaol. The recording is wonderful. Also included is the "tea scene" from The Importance of Being Earnest, as performed by Vanessa Redgrave and Lynn Redgrave. I recommend reading the book. While the CD seems not to be readily available online, it's possible to find audio recordings of Corin Redgrave reading the letter, and they ought to be worth checking out. He's also performing the letter at the National Theatre again this autumn.