RARA-AVIS: Re: Jacobean Noir

From: Chris Schneider ( chrisaschneider@earthlink.net)
Date: 24 May 2003


on 2/12/03, Russell James at look@russelljames.co.uk wrote:

> It is overtly based on Middleton's best known Jacobean sex shocker
> "The Changeling."

Ah, the Jacobeans! Admittedly, I tend a little more towards Cyril Tourneur
(cf. "The Revenger's Tragedy") and John Webster (cf. "The Duchess of Malfi" and "The White Devil"), but "The Changeling is pretty terrific too.

If you're interested in Middleton, though, you might want to know about a very decent modern-day adaptation of it by Canadian playwright Brad Fraser entitled "The Ugly Man." Fraser you might know through his play (later adapted to film) entitled "Love And Human Remains." "Ugly Man," though, turns Middleton's -- *and* coauthor Rowley's -- protagonist into a 20th-century, omnisexual seducer and manipulator. The results? A play that's both gruesome and funny, in pretty much equal measure.

Here's the publisher's description:

"A hideously disfigured stranger, hired as a field hand on an isolated ranch filled with beautiful people who have disturbing scars of their own, brings their morbid depravity to the surface. An unforgettable play about the true evil that exists inside all people." (Newest Press)

Chris

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