591 posts
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Post by AddisonMizner on Oct 24, 2022 7:41:10 GMT
I hope it's not A Little Life I hope it is! Consider me booked if it is A LITTLE LIFE!
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5,288 posts
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Post by mrbarnaby on Oct 25, 2022 7:31:09 GMT
Consider me booked if it is A LITTLE LIFE! It’s your lucky day!
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3,086 posts
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Post by Rory on Oct 25, 2022 8:06:52 GMT
Consider me booked if it is A LITTLE LIFE! It’s your lucky day! Is it the original Dutch version or is Van Hove doing it with a new cast?
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Post by danb on Oct 25, 2022 8:08:04 GMT
Consider me booked if it is A LITTLE LIFE! It’s your lucky day! Now THAT will need trigger warnings! Such a dark, upsetting read; it will be interesting to see it translated to the stage.
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Post by Deleted on Oct 25, 2022 8:13:14 GMT
Now THAT will need trigger warnings! Such a dark, upsetting read; it will be interesting to see it translated to the stage. Not to derail the focus on Tammy Faye, but A Little Life is playing right now at BAM in NYC (in Dutch with subtitles). I saw it this past weekend.
It is as intense and potentially off-putting as some readers found the book. A fair number of walk outs at intermission.
The reviews have been mixed to pretty unfavorable.
These links do not work - Burly
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Post by danb on Oct 25, 2022 8:22:21 GMT
If you didn’t know or appreciate the book you might think it was another ‘Jagged Little Pill’ style “how many issues can we chuck in here” type shenanigan, but it would really be a struggle to adapt it for the stage. Hopefully the negatives are critical of the content rather than the form. I couldn’t sit in the Phoenix for four hours. I struggled for an unbroken hour and forty.
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5,288 posts
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Post by mrbarnaby on Oct 25, 2022 9:07:45 GMT
I saw it in Amsterdam and it was , like the book, long, brutal and astonishing.
I suspect it will cause quite the stir when it opens in London
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591 posts
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Post by AddisonMizner on Oct 25, 2022 9:12:35 GMT
How exciting! Hoping that A LITTLE LIFE is officially announced soon. I would also like to know if it is a new English translation or in Dutch. Not that surtitles bother me - I’m use to them in opera.
Maybe we should start a new A LITTLE LIFE thread so as not to hijack Tammy Faye.
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5,288 posts
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Post by mrbarnaby on Oct 25, 2022 9:22:14 GMT
How exciting! Hoping that A LITTLE LIFE is officially announced soon. I would also like to know if it is a new English translation or in Dutch. Not that surtitles bother me - I’m use to them in opera. Maybe we should start a new A LITTLE LIFE thread so as not to hijack Tammy Faye. It will be in English
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3,086 posts
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Post by Rory on Oct 25, 2022 9:27:04 GMT
If you didn’t know or appreciate the book you might think it was another ‘Jagged Little Pill’ style “how many issues can we chuck in here” type shenanigan, but it would really be a struggle to adapt it for the stage. Hopefully the negatives are critical of the content rather than the form. I couldn’t sit in the Phoenix for four hours. I struggled for an unbroken hour and forty. I think it's maybe the Harold Pinter, not the Phoenix, but over 4 hours in there isn't an enticing prospect either!
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Post by nottobe on Oct 25, 2022 11:49:25 GMT
Assuming this will probably have some stars attached to it as it's going to the West End and in English. ITA shows have tended to have short runs at the Barbican which doesn't seem to be the case anymore. I hope they bring some of Robert Ickes productions over.
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Post by inthenose on Oct 25, 2022 12:24:19 GMT
I can’t wait for the video cameras.
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Post by wingfield on Oct 25, 2022 14:39:12 GMT
I've heard that it'll be at the Harold Pinter with an English cast - they apparently tried and failed to get Ben Whishaw on board
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Post by Deleted on Oct 25, 2022 18:33:51 GMT
OK, trying links again and including them directly as a backup. Not sure why they did not work before.
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5,288 posts
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Post by mrbarnaby on Oct 25, 2022 18:45:19 GMT
It will be at the Harold Pinter- not the Phoenix.. pretty sure I said that
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18,842 posts
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Post by BurlyBeaR on Oct 25, 2022 18:53:53 GMT
It will be at the Harold Pinter- not the Phoenix.. pretty sure I said that No, you didn’t actually. Not recently anyway. Feel free to prove me wrong by quoting where you DID say that of course.
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3,086 posts
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Post by Rory on Oct 25, 2022 18:56:32 GMT
I think this whole thread started after mrbarnaby said that there was a major play opening at the Harold Pinter in March (page 12 of the Tammy Faye thread). Then some, including me, thought it would be The Shining but it turned out to be A Little Life.
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18,842 posts
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Post by BurlyBeaR on Oct 25, 2022 19:01:18 GMT
I thought it started with speculation about where Tammy Faye was going. Happy to be proven wrong though. If Mr B wants to commit to A Little Life going to the Pinter I’ll remove “rumour” and put that in the thread title.
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3,086 posts
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Post by Rory on Oct 25, 2022 19:04:18 GMT
I thought it started with speculation about where Tammy Faye was going. Happy to be proven wrong though. It did and I wondered if TF would go to the Pinter or the Phoenix and then Mr B said a major play was booked for the Pinter in March so it couldn't go there.
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18,842 posts
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Post by BurlyBeaR on Oct 25, 2022 19:26:01 GMT
I thought it started with speculation about where Tammy Faye was going. Happy to be proven wrong though. It did and I wondered if TF would go to the Pinter or the Phoenix and then Mr B said a major play was booked for the Pinter in March so it couldn't go there. “A major play”. That’s not the same as saying A Little Life is going to the Pinter.
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Post by ThereWillBeSun on Oct 25, 2022 22:44:11 GMT
I saw it in Amsterdam and it was , like the book, long, brutal and astonishing. I suspect it will cause quite the stir when it opens in London ABSOLUTELY. I saw this in the Netherlands too and it is one of the most shocking plays I've seen. Bearing in mine it was performed in Dutch (I attended a surtitled show) .... I physically struggled to watch some parts; had my hands over my mouth (because I felt that uncomfortable) It was very interesting seeing other audience reactions as it was in the traverse. Just walked around after in a daze with my family member who treated me to the ticket for my Christmas present - bless them. I would compare it to Angels in America, The Normal Heart and The Inheritance. I don't regret seeing ALL - the book is brilliant if anyone wants an intense read!
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Post by alessia on Oct 26, 2022 9:31:33 GMT
I don't regret seeing ALL - the book is brilliant if anyone wants an intense read! Interesting- I thought this was among the worst books I've ever read. Hours of my life I won't get back. Needless to say I won't be going to see the play lol. To each their own I guess.
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2,536 posts
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Post by n1david on Oct 26, 2022 9:46:19 GMT
I appreciated the book - I couldn't say I enjoyed it - and thought it was a serious story well-told. Can't quite bring myself round to 4 hours of it in a theatre though.
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Post by alessia on Oct 26, 2022 9:54:12 GMT
I thought it was akin to abuse porn, for want of a better definition. Really mystified at the level of admiration this got when it was published.
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Post by happytobehere on Oct 26, 2022 10:04:02 GMT
I thought it was akin to abuse porn, for want of a better definition. Really mystified at the level of admiration this got when it was published. Glad to see that I’m not alone in this opinion. I found this book to be tacky trauma porn.
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227 posts
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Post by barelyathletic on Oct 26, 2022 10:12:23 GMT
Everybody who's read the book says it's amazing. Every time I pick it up in a bookshop for my next read I think "complete misery fest. Why would I bother?" Not excited by seeing it on stage either. I loved (the original productions of) The Normal Heart and Angels in America and admired The Inheritance, but this just sounds like torture, mentally and physically. Maybe it will pull in an audience from fans of the novel or fans of any big name attached, but I can't get excited about it. The whole thing just makes me feel a bit sad.
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868 posts
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Post by karloscar on Oct 26, 2022 10:20:40 GMT
A Little Life has played the UK already as it was at the Edinburgh Festival this summer before heading to New York. The book is definitely abuse porn and the play seems to concentrate this to a new intensity by having the abusers all played by the same actor and focusing solely on the character of Jude. I read it with an open mind and concluded the author had never met a gay man in her life before. None of the characters were remotely believable, the actor Willem had a career that Hugh Jackman, Daniel Day Lewis and Gene Kelly couldn't compete with, and poor Jude gets ludicrously abused for decades while building a high level career when anyone else would need 24 hour care if they remained alive. Any sympathy you have for the characters dwindles as the writer piles on the self-indulgent misery porn.
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Post by alessia on Oct 26, 2022 10:25:54 GMT
Everybody who's read the book says it's amazing. Every time I pick it up in a bookshop for my next read I think "complete misery fest. Why would I bother?" Not excited by seeing it on stage either. I loved (the original productions of) The Normal Heart and Angels in America and admired The Inheritance, but this just sounds like torture, mentally and physically. Maybe it will pull in an audience from fans of the novel or fans of any big name attached, but I can't get excited about it. The whole thing just makes me feel a bit sad. When a good friend (not really that good now, but this is nothing to do with the book lol) told me that years back this was her FAVOURITE book, I went and read it. Should have read more comments online. Some spoilers follow! The more I was reading, the more I was like 'and now THIS happens to him too?' What ELSE can possibly happen to this one person? And, another spoiler alert: what goes on with the other two friends who are fully part of the story in the first half of the book...they just vanish without explanation half way through. When I learned they'd made a play my first reaction was 'WHY??'
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Post by alessia on Oct 26, 2022 10:28:41 GMT
A Little Life has played the UK already as it was at the Edinburgh Festival this summer before heading to New York. The book is definitely abuse porn and the play seems to concentrate this to a new intensity by having the abusers all played by the same actor and focusing solely on the character of Jude. I read it with an open mind and concluded the author had never met a gay man in her life before. None of the characters were remotely believable, the actor Willem had a career that Hugh Jackman, Daniel Day Lewis and Gene Kelly couldn't compete with, and poor Jude gets ludicrously abused for decades while building a high level career when anyone else would need 24 hour care if they remained alive. Any sympathy you have for the characters dwindles as the writer piles on the self-indulgent misery porn. Oh I'd forgotten that Willem was an actor!
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1,465 posts
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Post by foxa on Oct 26, 2022 10:47:49 GMT
I found the book frustrating as it focused more and more on Jude's trauma - there was much love and centring of Jude, though why he attracted so much affection was not really conveyed in the novel beyond him being perhaps a modern equialent of an ever pierced and suffering medieval saint. The New York Times review suggests that up to a third of the audience walked out by the interval - so must be tough-going.
However I was really impressed that the author wrote the book while holding down a demanding full-time job.
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