"Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolfe?"

[truth seeker]

In thinking about the death of Elizabeth Taylor, I wanted to mention this film. Basically, it's about a couple who's been married for years and has scathing arguments. The wife (Martha played by Taylor) is the daughter of the president of a university. The husband (George played by Richard Burton) is an associate history professor.

What I found interesting was some of the subject matter that is brought up in the jabs. It speaks to the expectations people bring to marriage and connects slightly to what happens in academic circles (how some people go about acquiring the positions they do).

It all culminates at the end with an agreement the couple had that they kept secret and Martha's final decision to face the truth.. I thought it was really well done.

I'll post a link for people to just get an idea of what the movie looks like. Don't read the storyline/synopsis if you want to watch it without knowing anything more about it.

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0061184/

 

[Avi]

A great story, truth seeker, in terms of its learning potential, IMO, and is based upon the stage-play written by Edward Albee. It is widely considered to be Albee's best known work.

I realize you mentioned this because of Taylor, but in terms of Albee, another play well worth reading is "The American Dream" for it hits home at the farce of such a "dream".

His work is commonly referred to as "theatre of the absurd" but nonetheless has a nice look at the REALITY of the so-called dream with subtle yet cutting commentary on the debilitating restraints of our socially conditioned world.

Edit: Comments Albee makes re "The American Dream"

Albee explores not only the falsity of the American Dream but also the American family's status quo. As he states in the preface to the play, "[It is] an examination of the American Scene, an attack on the substitution of artificial for real values in our society, a condemnation of complacency, cruelty, emasculation, and vacuity; it is a stand against the fiction that everything in this slipping land of ours is peachy-keen."

 

[truth seeker]

A great story, truth seeker, in terms of its learning potential, IMO, and is based upon the stage-play written by Edward Albee. It is widely considered to be Albee's best known work.

Absolutely! And what was also great is that they didn't adapt it in such a way as to make it look more movielike as they would do today. Although a film, it feels very much like a play with it's short cast list and minimum use of locations.

I'll have to look into The American Dream, it sounds interesting. Thanks. :)

 

[Avi]

A great story, truth seeker, in terms of its learning potential, IMO, and is based upon the stage-play written by Edward Albee. It is widely considered to be Albee's best known work.

Absolutely! And what was also great is that they didn't adapt it in such a way as to make it look more movielike as they would do today. Although a film, it feels very much like a play with it's short cast list and minimum use of locations.

I'll have to look into The American Dream, it sounds interesting. Thanks. :)

You are welcome. Thanks for bringing up this thread as it brings back interesting memories.

Here is a bit that Albee wrote concerning the origins of "Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf"

I was in there having a beer one night, and I saw "Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?" scrawled in soap, I suppose, on this mirror. When I started to write the play it cropped up in my mind again. And of course, who's afraid of Virginia Woolf means who's afraid of the big bad wolf . . . who's afraid of living life without false illusions. And it did strike me as being a rather typical, university intellectual joke.

— Edward Albee [2]

 

[truth seeker]

Here is a bit that Albee wrote concerning the origins of "Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf"

I was in there having a beer one night, and I saw "Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?" scrawled in soap, I suppose, on this mirror. When I started to write the play it cropped up in my mind again. And of course, who's afraid of Virginia Woolf means who's afraid of the big bad wolf . . . who's afraid of living life without false illusions. And it did strike me as being a rather typical, university intellectual joke.

— Edward Albee [2]

Glad you brought that up because that's really the crux of the movie, two people facing their childhood demons/wounding that were affecting their present behavior and deciding to face the truth and begin to grow up. They came out of the darkness of that to face the light (literally and figuratively).