Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?

Rating:
Summary: it has value since some people love it...
Review: ...but this play is like so much of Albee's work - a lot of bickering and wallowing in squalor.

People who say this is one of the best plays ever written - have they never read or seen anything by Shakespeare???

AND if they like Shakespeare too... how is it possible? Albee's plays are almost the opposite of Shakespeare's - where Albee's plays deal with one conversation or one night and one location, Shakespeare's span continents and months. Where Albee's plays are usually about nasty, bitter people who hate each other, Shakespeare's plays always deal with a multitude of relationships and personality types. Where Shakespeare has intricate plots, Albee's plots are negligible.

Besides, Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf, while perhaps daring in 1962, is now dated. Couples no longer cling together like George & Martha - they get divorced. Alcoholism is more likely now to be addressed. And fertility technologies have come a long way, so it's doubtful that G & M would have stayed childless in 2004.

Finally... I've never heard a truly coherent theory for the point of the non-existent baby - not somebody's off-the-cuff explanation, but something that makes sense when examined from all angles - but of course that would take much too long to get into here.

And I entirely agree with the reviewer who complained of 3 hours of screaming - but that's what this play is about - a married couple's angst, and the audience is forced to endure it with them over long hours.

As Shakepeare might say - all sound and fury, signifying nothing.

Rating:
Summary: one of the best modern plays
Review: A play in three acts, a very simple setting, and only four characters who live in a small, university town in America: a middle-aged couple, Martha and George. And a "young and innocent" couple, Nick and Honey. They all meet in a room, in Martha and George's house, very late one night, for a nightcap. And then...all hell breaks lose.

The play tears apart both marriages: the middle aged couple, who seem to hate each other and in the end turn out to be much more devoted to each other as it would seem. The young, seemingly perfect couple, who turn out to have lots of problems of their own. In three heart-breaking scenes, using dialogue that cuts like a knife, Edward Albee has written a masterpiece. He manages to give a clear-cut, honest picture of the reality of marriage, the reality of love, and the fears that go hand in hand with love and intimacy. At some point, in act three, Martha talks about her husband- and it's probably one of the best pieces of literature I've read:

"...George who is out somewhere there in the dark...George who is good to me, and whom I revile; who understands me, and whom I push off; who can make me laugh, and I choke it back in my throat; who can hold me, at night, so that it's warm, and whom I will bite so there's blood; who keeps learning the games we play as quickly as I can change the rules; who can make me happy and I do not wish to be happy, and yes I do wish to be happy, George and Martha: sad, sad, sad."

What more can I say? just read the play, and if you get the chance, watch it performed in the theatre, too.

Rating:
Summary: one of the best modern plays
Review: A play in three acts, a very simple setting, and only four characters who live in a small, university town in America: a middle-aged couple, Martha and George. And a "young and innocent" couple, Nick and Honey. They all meet in a room, in Martha and George's house, very late one night, for a nightcap. And then...all hell breaks lose.

The play tears apart both marriages: the middle aged couple, who seem to hate each other and in the end turn out to be much more devoted to each other as it would seem. The young, seemingly perfect couple, who turn out to have lots of problems of their own. In three heart-breaking scenes, using dialogue that cuts like a knife, Edward Albee has written a masterpiece. He manages to give a clear-cut, honest picture of the reality of marriage, the reality of love, and the fears that go hand in hand with love and intimacy. At some point, in act three, Martha talks about her husband- and it's probably one of the best pieces of literature I've read:

"...George who is out somewhere there in the dark...George who is good to me, and whom I revile; who understands me, and whom I push off; who can make me laugh, and I choke it back in my throat; who can hold me, at night, so that it's warm, and whom I will bite so there's blood; who keeps learning the games we play as quickly as I can change the rules; who can make me happy and I do not wish to be happy, and yes I do wish to be happy, George and Martha: sad, sad, sad."

What more can I say? just read the play, and if you get the chance, watch it performed in the theatre, too.

Rating:
Summary: A Towering Dramatic Achievement
Review: A Streetcar Named Desire, Death of a Salesmen, Angels in America, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead, Long Day's Journey into the Night. These are the plays that share the ground with Edward Albee's play Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf. These plays have reached the pinacle of excellence.

Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf centers around an all night drink-fest between two married couples: George and Martha, who have been married for sometime, and Nick and Honey, a relatively new couple. The first act sets all this up, but the way Albee sets this up is the stuff of high drama. The quips his characters throw back and forth prepares the reader for the action that will follow. And we want it to. The action is the verbal brawl that the four principals have. The second act, entitled 'Walpurgisnacht', is one of the most exhausting pieces of fiction. The reader feels drained by the end of the second act. However, it's the third act (correctly entitled 'The Exoricism'-which was Albee's original title) that provides the catharsis.

Edward Albee has written a brilliant, landmark play. The Pulitzers made the biggest mistake when overlooking it for the prize. Albee won for three other plays (Three Tall Women, Seascape, and Delicate Balance), none of which contain the power that is "Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf".

Rating:
Summary: The torturous love of a forlorn marriage
Review: Albee presents with a facade of a very simple play from the start. There are only four characters and the solitary setting is a mere room. As the story unwinds and each character is plunged into the depths of analysis, the game continues. A cruel game is fought incessently and without any rules. Each character is shockingly unique, yet equally essential to the display of inhumane cruelty. Albee is a master of words- his dialogue flows with captivating intensity and unrelenting brilliance. His style is beyond clever- often disturbingly immoral, yet shockingly humane. The rollercoaster ride that he straps the reader to is odorned with the fullness of human emotions- distress, humiliation. love, and hate. I read this play in a single sitting.. and yes my heart was racing until and far beyond the last word.

Rating:
Summary: Who's Afraid of George and Martha?
Review: Brilliant.Simply smashing so. This well written play takes place in three acts.A drama really,but with riotous hints of wry black comedy(Honey[hapily]:Oh!Violence!Violence!)bubbling behind every spoken word. A bickering twosome(George and Martha)invite guests over to their house,at the conclusion of a faculty party hosted by Martha's father(the college president).The guests are Nick and Honey,an equally mis-matched pair,married for all the wrong reasons,but who retreat to the confort of denial whenever things get too real. As dawn approaches,they all become drunker and drunker,and angrier and angerier.Every discourse punctuated by an explosive shout.Think along the lines of Lester and Carolyn from "American Beauty",if they got stuck in the same room as their schizo neighbors: George disgustedly attacks Nick,who works in the biology dept.("gonna screw with our chromoZONES,and make us all look the same"),in between Martha's blatant attempts at seducing him.All the while,Honey stands back,blurting out random nonsense.All in all,it's an emotionally exhausting experience. Fun at first,but quickly snowballing downward with the speed of an avalanche into the private hell kept hidden under George and Martha's cheery,well behaved exteriors-their guests becoming unwitting pawns in a ruthless war. Recommended.

Rating:
Summary: Witty, sassy, funny!
Review: Brilliantly vitriolic, witty, and sassy, this is one of the most engrossing and readable dramas you are likely to come across. At its most basic level, this play is so simple - just four characters, one room, and all the action taking place in the space of a few hours. But in terms of substance this is a powerfully rich and complex work of genius. The writing cuts like a sharp knife, the characters are exquisitely developed and original, and their chemistry is charged with an undeniable energy.

The characters are at odds with each other throughout the play, and yet it is difficult to takes sides with only one of them. They are all both likeable and dislikeable at the same time. George is a mean-spirited passive-aggressive with a huge chip on his shoulder, but it's impossible not to root for him as he joyfully attacks his wife, Martha, for her fondness of the bottle and various other sins. Nick's demeanor is just a tad holier-than-thou, but it is easily forgivable given the outrageous treatment he is forced to endure throughout the evening. Honey, his wife, is a ditz and a lush, but loveable in the same way as an Irish Setter. Any one of the four could easily carry the show, and together they create a powerful tension that keeps the play moving at a brisk pace.

It is easy to see why Albee's writing has earned him a Pulitzer Prize. What is surprising is that is was another, lesser-known play and not this one that he won it for.

Rating:
Summary: Witty, sassy, funny!
Review: Brilliantly vitriolic, witty, and sassy, this is one of the most engrossing and readable dramas you are likely to come across. At its most basic level, this play is so simple - just four characters, one room, and all the action taking place in the space of a few hours. But in terms of substance this is a powerfully rich and complex work of genius. The writing cuts like a sharp knife, the characters are exquisitely developed and original, and their chemistry is charged with an undeniable energy.

The characters are at odds with each other throughout the play, and yet it is difficult to takes sides with only one of them. They are all both likeable and dislikeable at the same time. George is a mean-spirited passive-aggressive with a huge chip on his shoulder, but it's impossible not to root for him as he joyfully attacks his wife, Martha, for her fondness of the bottle and various other sins. Nick's demeanor is just a tad holier-than-thou, but it is easily forgivable given the outrageous treatment he is forced to endure throughout the evening. Honey, his wife, is a ditz and a lush, but loveable in the same way as an Irish Setter. Any one of the four could easily carry the show, and together they create a powerful tension that keeps the play moving at a brisk pace.

It is easy to see why Albee's writing has earned him a Pulitzer Prize. What is surprising is that is was another, lesser-known play and not this one that he won it for.

Rating:
Summary: A Near Perfect Literary Execution
Review: Considered by some to be Albee's masterpiece, Virginia Woolf presents all of the playwright's main themes in this tightly compressed play. In a mere three acts, Albee breeches social as well as physical masochism at its most malevolent while displaying its truth-revealing effects while exposing its subconscious motivations. As for other Albee-eque motifs, there is his presentation of truth verses reality, linguistics aerobics, and, as par, a heavy dose of black humor. Albee remains faithful as a master of literature in that he never lapses into didacticism even when his characters voice personal soliloquies. As an aside, the play does differ from the famous film in that the former takes place within the confides of George and Martha's household, thus keeping their guests, Nick and Honey, as metaphorical prisoners throughout the night. Perhaps the most enjoyable aspect of the play, upon a close reading, is Albee's almost virtuoso execution of symbolism, especially Christian (comparable to Henry James). Highly recommended.

Rating:
Summary: A Near Perfect Literary Execution
Review: Considered by some to be Albee's masterpiece, Virginia Woolf presents many of the playwright's main themes in this tightly compressed play. In a mere three acts, Albee breeches social as well as physical masochism at its most malevolent while displaying its truth-revealing effects while exposing its subconscious motivations. As for other Albee-eque motifs, there is his presentation of truth verses reality, linguistic aerobics, and, as par, a heavy dose of black humor. Albee remains faithful as a master of literature in that he never lapses into didacticism even when his characters voice personal soliloquies. As an aside, the play does differ from the famous film in that the former takes place within the confides of George and Martha's household, thus keeping their guests, Nick and Honey, as metaphorical prisoners throughout the night. Perhaps the most enjoyable aspect of the play, upon a close reading, is Albee's almost virtuoso execution of symbolism, especially Christian (comparable to Henry James). Highly recommended.