Category: Anthony Phelan

  Belvoir presents STRANGE INTERLUDE by Simon Stone after Eugene O’Neill at the Upstairs Belvoir St Theatre. This STRANGE INTERLUDE is a new Australian play by Simon Stone after the Eugene O’Neill original, written in 1927, presented on Broadway in 1928 by the Theatre Guild at the John Golden Theatre. This play was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for Drama in 1928. In preparing for the performance of this new play I read the original by Eugene O’Neill. I had read it was once before, many years ago, but barely remembered it, except for the impression that the leading role, that…

Belvoir presents THE WILD DUCK by Simon Stone with Chris Ryan after Henrik Ibsen in the Upstairs Theatre. THE WILD DUCK written by Simon Stone, also the Director, with Chris Ryan, after Henrik Ibsen’s play (1884) of the same name, is a new contemporary Australian play. This adaptation and re-writing, like Mr Stone’s other Ibsen inspired play (with Thomas Henning), THE ONLY CHILD (from Ibsen’s LITTLE EYOLF), as texts, presage a very good night in the theatre. Both of these texts are very interesting. This one better than the other, I felt. And while, if one is a committed Ibsenite,…

Ruminations: THE SEAGULL, UNCLE VANYA, THREE SISTERS and THE CHERRY ORCHARD, the four great plays of Anton Chekhov. THREE SISTERS is my favourite and the greatest in my estimation. UNCLE VANYA is the smaller gem and my next favoured. Both great, mostly, differing only, in the scale of their scenarios. What makes the works of Chekhov a favourite exploration for actors and audiences (especially, if you have the opportunity to see the works regularly, as in Europe, where they are a staple of the theatre ‘diet’) is the endless possibility of interpretation. The fine ambiguity of the Chekhovian text (I…