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Title: La Bete and Wrong Mountain: Two Plays by David Hirson by David Hirson ISBN: 0-8021-3821-7 Publisher: Grove Press Pub. Date: 10 May, 2001 Format: Paperback Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $14.00 |
Average Customer Rating: 4 (4 reviews)
Rating: 5
Summary: Spellbinding, Revolutionary Pieces of Theater
Comment: It is well nigh impossible to think of a playwright in the past twenty years who has sent greater shockwaves through the American theater than David Hirson. La Bete and Wrong Mountain were unlike anything Broadway had ever seen. And, for one brief shining moment, each made Broadway seem important again.
Part of what made these plays so exciting in the theater was the way in which they polarized audiences. I know people who were variously outraged, scandalized or confounded by them. ...
For my money, La Bete and Wrong Mountain were not only wonderfully entertaining, thought-provoking plays. They were the kind of audacious, category-defying miracles of theater that come along once, maybe twice, in a generation. And they were made doubly miraculous by their appearance on Broadway, a showbiz mecca that long ago ceased to be cutting-edge! (That they managed to survive even briefly in such an unhospitable environment is a miracle in itself!)
Normally, reading plays is not the greatest of pleasures. Having just finished this book, I can say unreservedly that La Bete and Wrong Mountain read like fantastic novels! They are both, after all, plays of language, and it is thrilling to luxuriate in Mr. Hirson's wordplay at one's own pace. There is also a remarkable preface by the author.
With this book, many people will have the opportunity to discover two gloriously unique works which are well on their way to assuming landmark status in the American theater. I envy them that discovery!
Rating: 5
Summary: The Controversy Continues!
Comment: When I read the two wildly divided opinions to Mr. Hirson's plays on this site, I was reminded of the critical response to Wrong Mountain. Some hailed it as magnificent, others dismissed it as dross. Which is exactly the kind of reaction that trailblazing works of art have always elicited: extremes of delight and revulsion.
I thought Wrong Mountain was a very great play. (I did not see La Bete.) That it managed only a short run on tourist-trap Broadway says more about Broadway, ultimately, than about the play. (Waiting for Godot, after all, was a failure on the Great White Way; Cats was a huge success!)
I am looking forward to reading La Bete to see if it maintains the same dizzyingly high standard as Wrong Mountain. Whether it does or not, Wrong Mountain is, in my opinion, an indispensable work of dramatic literature. And, like all major works, it is bound to remain extremely controversial. For Wrong Mountain alone, I give this book the highest rating.
Rating: 1
Summary: The first reviewer is, in my opinion, horribly misguided.
Comment: I had planned to be kind and forgo a review of this book, but after reading the first review, I couldn't let such laughably inane comments stand. The reviewer was 'priviledged' to see 'Wrong Mountain?' The play that was booted off Broadway after about a month, and was rightly savaged by the critics as a wordy, pretentious and ultimately bloated work? Please. The story was barely entertaining (only the presence of excellent actors allowed to be minimally watchable) and the writing was bland, unoriginal and superfluous. The play 'rededined' the form? Redefined bad writing, perhaps, but nothing more.
Move on to truly original works. Move past this writer who, in my opinion, drives people away from the theater with talky, self-absorbed trivialities.
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Title: The Misanthrope and Tartuffe by Richard Wilbur ISBN: 0156605171 Publisher: Harvest Books Pub. Date: 20 October, 1965 List Price(USD): $13.00 |
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Title: The Big Knife. by Clifford Odets ISBN: 0822201151 Publisher: Dramatist's Play Service Pub. Date: June, 1963 List Price(USD): $6.50 |
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Title: Waiting for Lefty and Other Plays by Clifford Odets ISBN: 0802132200 Publisher: Grove Press Pub. Date: August, 1993 List Price(USD): $15.00 |
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Title: The Monologue Audition: A Practical Guide for Actors by Karen Kohlhaas, David Mamet ISBN: 0879102918 Publisher: Proscenium Pub Pub. Date: 01 September, 2000 List Price(USD): $16.95 |
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