Jane Austen Archives - TheaterScene.net

Jane Austen

In Memory of Playwright/Director/Actor Douglas McGrath

November 12, 2022

In October, he opened in an autobiographical Off-Broadway play that he wrote, 'Everything's Fine"—a good-natured remembrance of his youth, and of a school teacher who fell for him. He performed the show, as usual, on the night of November 2nd, and everything did, indeed, seem to be fine. He was expecting to continue the run into 2023, and then focus on the film adaptation of "Beautiful." But on November 3rd, 2022, he died at his Manhattan office, unexpectedly, of a heart attack. [more]

Bedlam’s Persuasion

September 29, 2021

Bedlam’s 2014 production of "Sense and Sensibility," adapted by Kate Hamil from the novel by Jane Austen, and directed by Eric Tucker, set the bar so high for cleverness, originality and wit that we have come to expect this level of expectation from all of their future offerings. Unfortunately, their stage version of Austen’s last novel "Persuasion," a tale of mature love and second chances by first time playwright Sarah Rose Kearns, does not work as well. Among the problems are so much doubling and tripling that it becomes difficult to keep the characters separate and a lack of humor and irony that was inherent in the original material. Tucker seems to have forgotten that this should be a comedy of manners. [more]

Pride and Prejudice

November 27, 2017

While this is not a Bedlam production as was Hamill’s hugely successful stage version of Austen’s second published novel, "Sense and Sensibility," director Amanda Dehnert has staged the play in their inimitable style for this co-production of Primary Stages and Hudson Valley Shakespeare Festival and has created a clever 19th century entertainment with a decidedly 21st century sensibility. The versatile Hamill has also given herself the plum role of Elizabeth Bennet, here known as Lizzy. [more]