Who’s Afraid of a Little Sophistication?
Nothing can compare with the experience of watching a play.
As an audience member of Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf, I became more than just a spectator, I became entwined in the story, sitting with Kathleen Turner and Bill Irwin on their flowered couch in a small New England cottage.
Sitting in San Francisco’s famous Golden Gate Theater, this play was my first serious literary play (I hardly consider Mamma Mia a great work of literature) and it will always stay in my mind as the play that has it all: comedy, tragedy, mystery, and, saving the best for last, absolutely amazing actors and actresses that convey the complex emotions of the characters.
Much of the thigh-slapping, tear-evoking comedy is lost. The dramatic and depressing finale overwhelms it, but it is a factor that shouldn’t be forgotten. The very long play required two intermissions, and at the end of the ten-minute break I anticipated to laugh again and again. Of course, the ambiguous, surprising, and sobering end sparks what could potentially be hours of intense discussion.
Although I haven’t seen the movie with Elizabeth Taylor, no movie can compare with the experience of seeing a live show being acted out then and there just for you (as well as the other hundred people who paid pricey tickets). With a play there is only one chance to get the scene right, or you might as well go home. There is no such thing as editing. Every emotion is real. Every act is exhausting. Every searing monologue is triumphant. I am pleased to report that my first literary play experience was successful.
Maybe I’m maturing or maybe I’m growing into adulthood, but I was thoroughly entertained by a sophisticated and esoteric piece of literature. It made me want to see an opera, a ballet, go examine every art piece at the museum and finish my day off with a refined meal of brie and grapes. I realized that to be entertained you don’t have to be watching cartoons or Jim Carrey. I, I said to myself, I have just experienced the delight of an urbane evening at a classy theater watching an American literary classic with world renowned actors and actresses.