Regarding that Lincoln Center production, reviews at the time acknowledged that Trevor Nunn's production was inferior to the one he had staged in London. So, New York really hasn't seen a top-notch Arcadia - reason enough for Leveaux's production to come over.
For the hell of it, here are the opening two paragraphs of Vincent Canby's NY Times review of the Beaumont production:
THERE'S no doubt about it. "Arcadia" is Tom Stoppard's richest, most ravishing comedy to date, a play of wit, intellect, language, brio and, new for him, emotion. It's like a dream of levitation: you're instantaneously aloft, soaring, banking, doing loop-the-loops and then, when you think you're about to plummet to earth, swooping to a gentle touchdown of not easily described sweetness and sorrow.
That's the play.
Trevor Nunn's Lincoln Center Theater production, which opened last night in the Beaumont, is a reasonable American facsimile of those he staged in London, first at the Royal National in 1993, then at the Haymarket in the West End transfer last year. The Beaumont production looks gorgeous and is true to the letter and spirit of the Stoppard words, but it should be better.
Begin at the beginning and go on till you come to the end: then stop.
