Brantley loves Albee's The Lady from Dubuque

[playlover2010]

Posted: 3/5/12 at 11:00pm

And so do I! Powerful, powerful play -- totally surprised me. I loved it. Review linked below.


NY Times Review - Lady from Dubuque Updated On: 3/5/12 at 11:00 PM

[mallardo]

Posted: 3/6/12 at 3:10am

I haven't seen this production but I saw it in London a couple of years ago with a cast that had Maggie Smith in the title role and I too found it to be a powerful and fascinating play.

[After Eight]

Posted: 3/6/12 at 5:29am

I saw both the London production and this one. In both cases, it proved to be one of Albee's weakest plays. Tired bits and snatches from his previous works, none of which hang together. All told, tiresome and trying. Jane Alexander is very good, though.

[jayinchelsea]

Posted: 3/6/12 at 10:09pm

This play was excruciating to watch. It was a social evening with friends, but I should have known better. I saw the original with the magnificent Irene Worth, whose grand theatrical gestures at least kept act two from falling into a pit, as this production does. Jane Alexander is a wonderful naturalistic actress who, imo, is totally miscast as the mysterious Idahoan, but she is head and shoulders above the rest of the cast.

A beautiful new theatre space, but this play should have continued to rest in peace. Perhaps Brantley was as drunk when he wrote the review as Albee was when he wrote the play...

[Lavieboheme3090]

Posted: 3/6/12 at 10:46pm

But they were both sober enough to remember that the Dubque in question is in Iowa, not Idaho.

[EricMontreal22]

Posted: 3/7/12 at 12:47am

I actually find the play fasacinating on paper (I'd love to know what the changes made, as slight as they were). It's also a play I think could be a hard night in the theatre...

[After Eight]

Posted: 3/7/12 at 12:52am

^

Eric, you don't know how hard until you've sat through it.

[D2]

Posted: 3/7/12 at 7:42am

Especially after having to endure Pea Soup with Anise.

[henrikegerman]

Posted: 3/12/12 at 12:25pm

Saw it last night. My first time ever seeing it and I've never read it. Great production and the audience seemed very attune and responsive (one of my friends heard Jane Alexander in the lobby afterward saying what a great audience it was, which, of course might be a standard remark, but perhaps it really was an especially good audience and or (symbiotically) performance; who can tell?).

Michael Hayden is giving a terrific performance in a very difficult role. Jane Alexander is wonderful, funny, charming, warm and graceful. The play may be second rate Albee but give me second rate Albee any day. There is more than enough brilliance, poetry, honesty, and sheer fun in it to counterbalance the hackneyed Twilight Zone end of life absurdity, moments of overwrought caricature. Esbjornson has wisely cast Layla Robbins and Peter Francis James, who more than bear the weight of the play's missteps. Thomas Jay Ryan's Edgar and Tricia Paoluccio's Carol are standouts in the supporting cast.

[RippedMan]

Posted: 3/12/12 at 8:55pm

I hope the extension pops up on TDF because I'd love to see this.

[WiCkEDrOcKS]

Posted: 3/12/12 at 10:03pm

Are the $25 tickets, which the website says are available until the 25th, all sold out?

[Vespertine1228]

Posted: 3/13/12 at 11:28am

Saw it on Sunday. I hated every moment of it. It was a silly play about stupid people behaving irrationally. Most of the very talented cast was screaming the entire time. I can't believe I spent $25 on it, let alone the $75 people will spend on the extension.

That being said, it's exactly the kind of show the Signature should be doing. And the biggest theater in their new space is stunning.

[henrikegerman]

Posted: 3/13/12 at 12:25pm

"Most of the very talented cast was screaming the entire time."

Vespertine, you are certainly not alone in not liking this play, but who, besides Catherine Curtin (Lucinda), can possibly be said to be screaming all the time in the Signature's cast? Jane Alexander barely raises her voice above a gorgeous stage whisper. She and Peter Francis James dominate the second act and the only time James's voice is over the top is when he briefly spouts faux-Japanese while threatening jujitsu.

I also find your comment ironic given that "Hurt Village" is playing across the lobby. Not to imply that it isn't a good and important play, but there you really will find most of a very talented cast screaming all the time. In the case of the first act, relentlessly.

[D2]

Posted: 3/13/12 at 12:33pm

Maybe Vespertine got the productions mixed up, like the way Hal Prince confused Madeline Kahn for Bernadette Peters?

[jayinchelsea]

Posted: 3/13/12 at 5:50pm

Thanks, Vespertine1228, for your honest comments about this show. I went with four other friends, all very serious theatergoers, and we were all furious by the time the play was over. Albee has undoubtedly written some brilliant plays, but this is not one of them. The original reviews, in a much better production in 1980, were spot on, and the play deserved the derision it received. If it had been written by Sam Smith, it wouldn't have been produced in the first place, let alone revived 30-odd years later.

[henrikegerman]

Posted: 3/13/12 at 6:02pm

^Interestingly, Jay, I had the exact opposite reaction. That if this were a Sam Smith play, it would not only have been produced, but would have been much better received. Instead of the play being seen as a huge disappointment from an acknowledged wunderkind, Smith might well have been touted as a very talented fresh (albeit Albee-esque) voice and the play as a very fine first effort. Of course, this is all theoretical, and that's just my opinion.

Mainly I base that on the fact - apart from the fact that I like "Lady from Dubuque" - that there are many worse plays - a lot worse - that are hyped to the max.