Mahabarata by Peter Brooks
Macbeth by Orson Welles
Henry V by Kenneth Branagh
Woyzeck, oh yes.
The Iceman Cometh by Eugene O’Neill , both versions.
Stalag 17 by Donald Bevan & Endmund Trzcinski
Glengarry Glen Ross by David Mamet
Little Murders by Jules Feiffer
Harvey by Mary Chase
Bug by Traci Letts
I’d probably have Harold Pinter’s Betrayal, if they’d only put the damn thing on DVD.
I’m stoked for John Patrick Shanley’s Doubt.
I just wish that he had kept Bryan F. O’Byrne.
I love this subject. Thanks a lot.
Doubt. Just kidding. Just saw it and was good, but not “favorite” material.
Hugh Hefner presents Macbeth, Directed by Roman Polanski
Lotta love for Julie Taymor’s Titus
Kushner’s Angels in America
Agee’s Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?
I like Casablanca and Ran very much.
Equus
Death of a Salesman
Glass Menagerie
“Glengarry Glen Ross” is like a dream team of a cast. You can’t go wrong there. “Hurly Burly”, although not anywhere as good as Glengarry, still gave us a great opportunity to see Sean Penn revisit an intriguing character which he played on stage. That is a difficult script, and they truncated it quite a bit, but there are some great moments in this film. “This So-Called Disaster” gives us an excellent look at the process of theatre from some truly gifted artists working through a script.. Penn, Nolte and Shepard are also pretty close to a dream team, and this fly on the wall type look at the mounting of a Shepard play is amazing viewing. Check it out.
Robert Altman’s rendition of Secret Honour
Tennessee Williams’ SUDDENLY LAST SUMMER and Eugen O’Neill’s THE ICE MAN COMETH (the version starring Lee marvin and Jeff Bridges) were superb as films.
AMADEUS is a great film, but worked equally as successfully, albeit DIFFERENTLY, when on stage.
So much of Shakespeare has been done well on film. I, too, am preferential to the Kurosawa takes — THRONE OF BLOOD, RAN, and THE BAD SLEEP WELL, but also to Zeffirelli’s ROMEO AND JULIET and very much to Olivier’s little-seen OTHELLO from 1965.
And …
May we include musicals here? It is not my favorite form, but you can never discount MY FAIR LADY as genuinely great cinema. And I would go as far as to say that WEST SIDE STORY, OLIVER!, FUNNY GIRL, and FIDDLER ON THE ROOF were actually better as films just because of the scope of the productions, no?
“Ran” and “Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolfe?”
I do love West Side Story
Blithe Spirit gets my vote.
Whoa whoa.
How have we forgotten Hedwig?
Sunset Blvd.
The Bad Seed
The Shape of Things
The House of Yes
I guess those are more “favourite films based on plays” come to think of it.
Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?, Glengarry Glen Ross, Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, etc…
There are plenty of great ones, but I don’t think anything has topped Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? That movie is unbelievably good.
“Marat/Sade,” “Butley,” “Glengarry Glen Ross” and “The History Boys.” I’m partial to Mankiewicz’s “Sleuth,” too, just for the delicious fun of it all. (The remake, despite its Harold Pinter pedigree and the novelty of Michael Caine playing opposite his former character, didn’t do a thing for me.)
Glad we had an old thread on this subject. I was just thinking about Doubt and In Bruges (I mistakenly thought the latter was based on a play, turns out it’s an original screenplay written by a playwright). I love plays on films because the dialogue is presumably already carrying it’s own weight and a good director can be free to focus on making it visually come alive. I have to add the obvious Raisin in the Sun and Streetcar Named Desire.
Jay brings up an interesting idea. What about playwrights’ forays into writing for film? I know two of my favorites out of the 1980s had playwrights behind the typewriter: Sam Shepard with PARIS, TEXAS and Tom Stoppard with BRAZIL. Both film certainly feel ‘literary’ to me in that the narrative, the dialogue, the story arc feel as important to the films as the striking images for which they are known. Can we think of original screenplays penned by playwrights or novelists—where it shows?
Anthony Schaffer, The Wicker Man and Sleuth
Woyzeck
Glengarry was pretty faithful, but opened up cinematically too.
Tennessee Williams plays (ie. Baby Doll, A Streetcar named Desire, Suddenly last Summer, Night of the Iguana etc. etc)
Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?
Amadeus
I haven’t seen many plays & I’m assuming that doesn’t matter?
We read a lot of Eugene O’Neill in college…I think Sidney Lumet’s film of Long Day’s Journey into Night is one of the best acted films ever made.
I never saw any production of Marat/Sade, but the film by Peter Brook is a masterpiece.
For musicals, I love Guys & Dolls (I was lucky enough to see Nathan Lane on B’way and I STILL love the Sinatra Nathan)
Melo
Woyzeck (Herzog’s)
Bergman supposedly developed The Seventh Seal from one of his own plays.
Kim Nall
Not always the easiest transition, but a few hold up. My personal favorite is Eugene O’Neill’s Long Day’s Journey Into Night.
Thoughts?