Irish Rep's 'Disciple' A Devilishly Good Play

"The Devil's Disciple" by George Bernard Shaw, now up at Manhattan's Irish Reportory Theatre, while not one of his major works, offers a fine evening, indeed. The play dates to 1897 and is the only play of Shaw's to be set during the American Revolution. It's the story of one Richard Dudgeon, also known as Dick, his mother Annie, his brother Christy, his Uncle Titus, and his cousin Essie. It's set in 1777 in rural New Hampshire; the first act is in the Dudgeon home.

The rascally Dick Dudgeon, serenely self-confident, is home to hear read his dead father's new and final will, where it is revealed that he is heir to the family home. His mother rushes out in anger.

Dick is a nonconformist and that grates on his Presbyterian family -- especially his mother -- and the local minister, Anthony Armstrong. Judith, the minister's wife, is appalled by the fact that Dudgeon is a nonconformist. In the second act, Judith is left alone in the Armstrong house with Dudgeon, while her husband rushes out to attend to Mrs. Dudgeon on her deathbed. Richard remarks that if anyone were to enter the house and see the two of them at tea, they would mistake them for man and wife.

British soldiers arrive and announce that they have come for Anthony Anderson, who is to be tried as a rebel. Dick takes his place, to Judith's sudden consternation, who suddenly sees him as heroic.

The third act takes place in the courtroom, with Major Swinton and General John Burgoyne presiding over Dick's trial. When Dick asks "Gentleman Johnny" to be shot as a soldier rather than hung as a traitor, Burgoyne counters, "Have you any idea of the average marksmanship of the army of King George the Third?" prompting the biggest laugh of the evening.

There is much to enjoy about this play -- for one, the staging by Tony Walton is remarkable. Shaw's wit shines through the entire performance. The settings are sparse and convincing, and good use is made of the Irish Rep's dual-sided stage. Rebecca Lustig's costumes add much to the play's period feel. The musical sound-effects provide additional authenticity.

Acting by Curzon Dobell (Anderson), Jenny Fellner (Judith), Lorenzo Pisoni (Dick), Craig Pattison (dual role as Christy Dudgeon and the Executioner), Darcy Pulliam (Mrs. Dudgeon), Robert Sedgewick (Swindon) and John Windstor-Cunningham (Burgoyne) was crisp throughout.
This play has been revived on Broadway, the last being in 1998-89. Don't wait the requisite years for the next revival. This one is outstanding, and closes Feb. 10th.

Patricia Jameson-Sammartano
Culture Editor, TheWildGeese.com

The Iceman Cometh: Ted Mann Reflects on O'Neill

The O'Neill Festival screened "The Iceman Cometh," a 1960 Play of the Week directed by Sidney Lumet, starring Jason Robards Jr. and a very young Robert Redford.

The film depicts the accounts surrounding the 60th birth day party of saloonkeeper Harry Hope, an Irish ward heeler, and the down and out characters who inhabit his Last Chance Saloon. They correspond to O'Neill's friends in his younger years, and the play is highly political. They are waiting for Theodore Hickman(Hickey) to arrive; Larry Slade and Don Parrit are dropouts from the anarchist movement.
Ted Mann, Producer, Circle in the Square
and Avrim Ludwig of "Inside the Actors' Studio"
Photo credit: Patricia Jameson-Sammartano

Ted Mann, who produced the 1956 Circle in the Square presentation of "Iceman", told of the play not succeeding on Broadway and of being summoned, with director Jose Quintero, by Mrs. O'Neill to talk about putting on the play at Circle in the Square, which had been a former nightclub with the windows painted over(to avoid the Prohibition revenue agents) The actors entering looked like ghosts.

Howard da Silva had originally been cast as Hickey, but left due to other commitments. According to a search of both Internet Movie and Broadway Databoards, he never did an O'Neill play; talk about missed opportunities. Jason Robards insisted on auditioning for the role, even though he had already been cast in the play. He read the 4th act monologue, and Mann said, "It was his role; nobody could touch Jason." Mann also recounted how he and Quintero called Robards' 12th Street home after the audition and asked for Hickey, just to let Robards know he had the role.

We were treated to a first-person account of theater history; Robards became associated with male roles in O'Neill plays, just as Jose Quintero became the "O'Neill Director." Mann produced both of them. Redford, who was an unknown actor cast by Sidney Lumet in the movie, went on to become Bob Woodward in "All the Presidents' Men," in which Robards appeard as Washington Post Managing Editor Ben Bradlee.

Returning to "Iceman," the denizens of the Last Chance all have hopes of one sort or another, and "these pipe dreams or aspirations are what kept them alive," according to Mann. He sees that as the essence of the play. He said that the current Broadway hit, "The Seafarer" also is acted much the way "Iceman" was, very naturalistically, and said of Robards, "Jason was needier onstage."

Mann has recently publlished his memoir, "Journeys In the Night."

And of "Long Day's Journey Into Night" which Mann also produced in 1956, he said that Mrs. O'Neill approached them and said no changes were to be made to the script and she would have to approve the cast. Eugene O'Neill had left instructions in his will that this play not be published until 25 years after his death(1953); by 1956, his sons Shane and Eugene Jr. had both committed suicide, and his daughter Oona was disinherited because she had married Charlie Chaplin. "The children were all dead to O'Neill," said Mann.

Production details on the original "Long Days Journey:" the cost of production was under $200,000 in 1956, and dentist friends of Mann's put up $250 a share for the play. Better than pulling teeth.

Patricia Jameson-Sammartano
Culture Editor, WGT

http://www.backstage.com/bso/search/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1003685021

O'Neill Festival at Provincetown Playhouse: O'Neill's Favorite Film

Think of John Wayne in a movie directed by John Ford. "The Searchers?" "Fort Apache?" "The Quiet Man?" "Rio Grande?" "The Man Who Shot Liberty Valence?" All are correct answers, but not the one we're looking for.

Imagine Wayne cast as an able-bodied Swedish seaman, complete with accent, and you have him in Eugene O'Neill's "The Long Voyage Home." Ole Olsen, who just wants to get back to his mother on the farm in Sweden. Motif, anyone?

Ed Berkeley, Julliard, director, Sea Plays

Photo credit: Patricia Jameson-Sammartano

"Voyage" is really four O'Neill plays distilled into one:"Bound East for Cardiff"(1916), "In the Zone"(1917), "The Long Voyage Home"(1917), and "The Moon of the Caribees"(1918). Dudley Nichols gets the screenwriting credit. The movie was filmed in 1940, explaining the references to the Fifth Column and the World War II propaganda.

John Ford's well-cast ensemble included a seaman of every ethnic type(the beginnings of political correctness masquerading as assimilation?), including Thomas Mitchell, who had played Gerald O'Hara in "Gone With the Wind" the year before. Mildred Natwick, who would play the Widow Tillane, Barry Fitzgerald, Michaleen Oge Flynn, and Ward Bond, Father Lonergan, all in "The Quiet Man," were also in "The Long Voyage Home."

Proving, we guess, that a good ensemble knows how to stay together.

According to the Internet Movie Database, this was Eugene O'Neill's favorite film; John Ford gave him a print and he watched it so many times, he wore it out.

Next up: "The Iceman Cometh" and Wednesday evening,"Anna Christie" with post- screening discussion by Liam Neeson.

Patricia Jameson-Sammartano

Culture Editor, WGT

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0032728/

The Hairy Ape: Classism in O'Neill

Last night's showing at the O'Neill Festival was "The Hairy Ape" which was produced off-Broadway last season by the Irish Repertory Theatre. It was fitting that founding producer

Ciarán O’Reilly and Gregory Derelian, who played the protagonist Yank, were the speakers for the after-screening event.

Ciarán O’Reilly looks on as Gregory Derelian reads O'Neill
Photo credit: Patricia Jameson-Sammartano

The setting of the play is a steamer on the Atlantic and a New York City apartment; the play was originally produced at the Provincetown Playhouse on March 9, 1922.

We asked Mr. O'Reilly how he managed the stage set, in view of the fact that the movie was so cinematic, and he said they used a hydraulic drop. Checking the awards page, the scenery at the Irish Rep was done by Eugene Lee, who was inducted into the theatre hall of fame and later designed the elaborate sets for "The Pirate Queen."

It was interesting hearing details of the highly-acclaimed production, and even more so to hear Mr. Derelian read from the script. He made the character of Yank come alive through his voice and body language even though he was not costumed.

The festival continues the sea plays tonight with a screening of "The Long Voyage Home."

Patricia Jameson-Sammartano
Culture Editor, WGT

http://www.theatermania.com/content/news.cfm/story/9192

Ah, Wilderness! Sunshine in O'Neill's Shadow

If "Long Day's Journey" is O'Neill's masterwork, "Ah, Wilderness!" is a 180-degree turn, one of the few comedies in his oevre.

This Independence Day, 1906 tale of the coming of age of a young Irish-American was modeled after the McGinley family of New London; they published the New London Day, the local paper where O'Neill was for some time a reporter.

Charlotte Moore of the Irish Repertory Theatre
Photo credit: Patricia Jameson-Sammartano
The play gave rise to the musical comedy "Take Me Along," for which Jackie Gleason won a Tony Award in 1960, and which is being revived at the Irish Repertory Theatre in the future.
There is no scheduled date; the play is in reviews currently. Said Charlotte Moore, Artistic Director of the Irish Rep, "This is a big musical and it's scary to do a big musical in a small space such as ours."

The audience was larger the second night of the festival, possibly owing to warmer weather. Some people wander in off the street; another woman told me she had seen the festival advertised in "The New York Times." We know of two people who found it courtesy of the Irish Rep's website.

Patricia Jameson-Sammartano
Culture Editor, WGT

Kickoff of O'Neill Festival: LDJ as Play of Redemption rather than Ruin

Last night was the first of the 10th annual O'Neill Festival at the Provincetown Playhouse. We watched a screening of "Long Day's Journey into Night" -- the Richardson/Hepburn version -- and listened to a lively discussion about the generosity of James Tyrone toward his sons and the nun/coquette role of Mary Tyrone.

Susan Chalfant and Steven Kennedy Murphy

Photo credit: Patricia Jameson-Sammartano

Saying, "It's impossible that it(LDJ)could have been written by anyone but an Irishman," actress Susan Chalfant went on to describe the beautiful lyricism of the play set against, "the wicked malice which is the spine of the Irish character." She mentioned O'Neill's use of selective memory and the characters' proclivities towards cruel remarks at one another, which they realized only the moment the words left their mouths.

Patricia Jameson-Sammartano

Culture Editor, WGT

http://www.thewildgeese.com/pages/ldjour.html

Tenth Annual O'Neill Festival at Provincetown Playhouse

The Tenth Annual O'Neill Festival kicks off tonight, January 4, 2008, at Provincetown Playhouse, 133 Macdougal Street, Greenwich Village, where O'Neill began his acting and playwriting career.

Curtain's up on his masterwork film, "Long Day's Journey Into Night" at 7 p.m., with discussion following led by Stephen Kennedy Murphy, artistic director of The O’Neill Festival, and featuring actress Kathleen Chalfant, who performed in the 2006 festival.

Photo credit Library of Congress
The festival is sponsored byThe Playwrights Theater of New York and O’Neill at Yale, sponsored by Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library; admission is free. The first seven nights will be retrospectives of his plays on film, with the last three nights live performances.

For more information, or to make reservations, go to http://www.ticketcentral.com/ or call 212-279-4200.

Patricia Jameson-Sammartano
Culture Editor, WGT







http://www.eugeneoneill.net/index.htm
http://www.eugeneoneill.net/films.htm

Athbhliain faoi mhaise duit! (Happy New Year!)

More than a million viewers crowded Times Square on December 31 to say goodbye to the old year and ring in 2008, celebrating 100 years of dropping what has now become the world's largest Waterford pendant. Weather was warm for this time of year, and the crowds were friendly. Anderson Cooper was in his usual rare form. So were the musicians, including Kid Rock and Carrie Underwood.

Photo credit: Patricia Jameson-Sammartano

The evening's theme, appropriately, was going green ... by saving electricity. That phrase and Times Square seem oxymoronic: The square at midnight is about as bright as a sunny noon. Still, efforts were taken to reduce the power wasting.


However, that's the last we'll do this for a while; standing on one's feet for six hours without moving too much is just a bit too much to take. ... The picture is of the New Year's Eve Waterford ball, viewed on the Jumbotron from our vantage point at 47th and 7th.




We think next year will be in the comfort of our living room watching this on TV. But this was one of those "Do it once in your lifetime" New York City experiences.


A happy and peaceful new year to all of our readers.

Patricia Jameson-Sammartano
Culture Editor, WGT

http://www.timessquarenyc.org/nye/nye_ball.html