A Little Life BAM ... Also London 2023- Page 3

[Play Esq.]

Posted: 10/19/22 at 4:11pm

n2nbaby said: "Going on Friday. Excited and nervous. It is probably my favorite book and I still cry just talking about it. It is one of the few pieces of art that has ever had that profound impact on me and I’m honestly just scared to “go there” again, if that makes sense."

That makes sense. And Ivo certainly won’t make this any easier of an experience (nor should he).  Im very interested how he’ll stage a very long (and often glorious) book to the theater.  
 

Having seen most of his work in NY, NYTW, BAM to Broadway, I’m hopefully that this will be a production theater folk talk about for some time.
 

Could not imagine missing this. 

[kwoc91]

Posted: 10/19/22 at 4:56pm

spicemonkey said: "if anyone interested, I am selling one ticket, Saturday 10/29/2022 7:00 PM as I won't be able to go - it would be too late to take the subway home after the show.

I paid $45 plus $9.5 in fees, selling it for $45

DM if interested
ticket is in PDF"

Sent you a DM!

[Sauja]

Posted: 10/19/22 at 6:06pm

Speaking of face value tickets for sale…I have a pair of mezzanine seats for $45 each on 10/26. J 27 and 29. I’m going to be traveling so can’t use them. Would love to make back the ticket cost if anyone wants the pair.

[bellelinus]

Posted: 10/19/22 at 6:47pm

I also have an onstage seat that I can't use for tomorrow night, 10/20. Was $95 with fees and my friend can't come. Could easily meet up and scan in together and then you could sit wherever you want on stage.

[TotallyEffed]

Posted: 10/21/22 at 10:41am

Anybody see it?

[JasonC3]

Posted: 10/21/22 at 12:49pm

Variety review.  Very positive.

Some spoilers, primarily about what happen to Jude as a child.

[kwoc91]

Posted: 10/21/22 at 2:53pm

Vulture Review not so positive, but the reviewer also did not care for the novel.

"The thing is so long, so cruel, so exhausting, and so finely aestheticized that I had to wonder if all involved had verged into self-parody."

I don't care what the reviews say...I'm glad I get to experience it next weekend. Starting to mentally prepare myself for it now.

[bellelinus]

Posted: 10/21/22 at 5:00pm

I was there last night, sat near the middle of the front row onstage (you pick your seat if you are onstage). If you didn't like the book, you won't like this, but I believe if you did respect the novel and see value in it (as I did) you would be impressed by this production. Since even going over 4 hours they had to prune a lot of the story, it is primarily Jude's story and extremely powerfully done. I found the staging to be excellent - screens on two sides with NYC street scenes, that were replaced slowly by static when Jude was dealing with his psychic pain. Primary set was a living room with kitchen. Subtitles were easy to read and over time I forgot I was reading them. Actors very very good in difficult roles. Being on stage made the experience more immersive, as at various points food that had been prepared on stage was passed along for us to consume as well. My friend had to cancel at the last minute so I gave myself permission going in to leave at intermission if I wanted, but I was fully committed to the story by then and didn't even consider leaving. Ivo van Hove was there and came out for bows. It was a very late night - got out of the building close to 11:30.

[Play Esq.]

Posted: 10/21/22 at 5:37pm

Thank you very much for this.  Very happy to hear such positive comments from someone who's read the book.

I generally always give myself license to leave a performance (life is too short for bad theater/opera), but I'm confident that I ain't leaving this 4.5 hour piece.  I can't say I loved the book, but I was enthralled by it and couldn't put it down.  Looking forward to next Saturday (going to be a heavy day between this and a matinee of The Piano Lesson)!

[Dolly80]

Posted: 10/21/22 at 5:39pm

A Little Life is opening in London next year

[raddersons]

Posted: 10/23/22 at 1:01am

https://www.newyorker.com/culture/the-theatre/a-little-life-is-a-little-much

Helen Shaw’s New Yorker review is so scathing it literally made me laugh out loud. I absolutely love her pinpoint eye and ability to dissect theater. Just one of the absolute best critics alive.

[VintageSnarker]

Posted: 10/23/22 at 5:40am

"His friends claim he’s a good listener, but in more than four hours, we never see him listen to anyone. As Parul Sehgal noted in “The Case Against the Trauma Plot” in this magazine, “trauma trumps all other identities, evacuates personality, remakes it in its own image.” To show us an empty man, hollowed out by atrocity, would be one thing, but the other characters insist that, in fact, Jude is a full person. Van Hove just doesn’t happen to demonstrate that in any scenes. He must have run out of time."

Debating when I should subscribe to the New Yorker for 12 weeks so I can read all her reviews from this season

[JasonC3]

Posted: 10/23/22 at 1:39pm

One orchestra aisle seat available for Wednesday, 10/26.

$95

See Buy/Sell Board

[JasonC3]

Posted: 10/25/22 at 6:51pm

Looks like BAM members can buy up to two tickets to Wednesday evening's performance at 50% off.  Discount is applied at checkout when you're logged in.

[TaylorF221]

Posted: 10/26/22 at 10:32am

Chiming in to say I really loved this. It was easily the best and (funnily) the most accessible thing Ivo has done, even with all the blood and violence. No cameras, no Ivo "tricks", just a heartbreaking story told well.

If you hate the book, you will obviously hate this, but if you liked the book you will be happy with the adaptation. I thought the critics were quite off as it's cool to hate on a book that a lot of people love.

Have also heard rumors of this transferring to London, I've heard it will be in English which will be exciting and warrant a second viewing.

 

[verywellthensigh]

Posted: 10/26/22 at 10:50am

"But the straw moment is easy to see coming: first, Jude says (in Dutch, translated for the audience in English supertitles), “You know, I’ve been lucky all my life.” Uh oh. Then a kindhearted man in a snuggly cardigan wanders centerstage to say he’s popping out on an errand. If we have learned one thing in the past five years (from “The Inheritance” on Broadway, from Taylor Swift), it is that cardigans mean sorrow."

LOL!!

[TotallyEffed]

Posted: 10/27/22 at 3:40pm

Major spoilers.

 

This adaptation has to gloss over quite a bit of the massive novel but it's a very faithful adaptation. Therefore, I found it to be just as silly, maudlin, and hilariously grotesque as the book. :) I think the story is incredibly over the top, its torture so unceasingly decadent, so violently indulgent that it makes any chance of a TV or film adaptation absolutely impossible. To see a fraction of these atrocities on screen would call forth the spirit of Mommie Dearest herself. This is high camp. It makes sense that the first attempt at an adaptation is for the stage, where the melodrama and passing of decades (and constant child rape) is slightly more digestible, if you're willing to sacrifice close to five hours of your little life for it.

The production itself is quite good, and the run time only started to drag for me in the last half hour or so. It was a very similar experience to reading the book for me. I turned each page and couldn't believe five hundred had already passed. I find the story engaging and entertaining, like a trashy soap opera. I found myself laughing at the theatre just as I had when I read the book. The abusive boyfriend and Willam's death are particularly hilarious and their truncated parts in the stage version make them even more glaringly silly. Jude starts dating a guy and is almost instantly beaten, raped, and thrown out the window. Willam and Jude start dating only for Willam to be smashed to smithereens by a drunken truck driver. Why not!

For whatever reason, people are drawn to the story. A woman behind me could barely contain her huffing and puffing. She made sure everyone around her knew that this was REALLY AFFECTING HER.

Glad I went!

 

[kwoc91]

Posted: 10/30/22 at 9:58am

I loved it. So glad I got to see it. 
 

As TotallyEffed said, the adaptation really highlights just how absurd the plot of the book is, so I’m not really going to comment on the actual story (which I did like when I read it many years ago). I thought the production itself was very well done, and the self-harm scenes were quite harrowing. They had to pause the show briefly after the first one because an onstage audience member fainted. 
 

Even though I knew how the story ended, and have soured on the book as a whole as time passed, I have to admit it still hit me emotionally in a similar way. I’ll be thinking about this one for a long time. 

[Play Esq.]

Posted: 10/30/22 at 3:35pm

Saw this last night and, while I’m glad to have seen it, I was very disappointed. 
 

The aspect of this production that really saddened me most is that there existed none of the joy that exists in the novel.  While Jude’s dissent was incredibly painful to get through in the book, it was a gradual build-up with intermittent moments of pure adulation (ie the adoption, everyone’s career trajectories, and the wedding).  Those moments were just glossed over here. 
 

Ivo’s interpretation was fine: neither career defining nor eurotrash. The usage of the NY setting was similar to that of his WSS, so not exactly novel. I suppose that was my second major disappointment for the show: few directors have ever affected me as much as Ivo but I found this to be among his lesser works in New York (Little Foxes, Scenes From a Marriage, and the Crucible being among my favorites…funny, Elizabeth Marvel was there last night). 
 

People will disagree with me perhaps, but if this book is to exist in another medium, it should be a mini-series: the slow build would be best suited there and we’d have a better understanding of all of the characters who wouldn’t feel so flat. 
 

Last note, was anyone else there last night? Someone sitting in the stage audience had a medical condition and required a “is there a dr in the house?” response from the actor playing Jude.  Someone responded from the orchestra and her issue seemed to be taken care of quite well (I hope at least). 

[JasonC3]

Posted: 10/30/22 at 5:04pm

I agree that the play unfortunately has lost much of the positive rhythms of friendship that I found integral throughout the book.  This then has a ripple effect that makes Jude's trauma even more harrowing, compounded that we bear witness to it on stage in a way that is far more intense than they book.

I don't find much in the book's plot to be absurd.  The respective success of the four main characters might be a bit unlikely to find in a quartet of college acquaintances, but certainly not completely unusual. And while the harm Jude inflicts on himself and experiences from others is more rare, I found it all very plausible given what he experienced as a boy.

I've heard Yanigahara talk about attempts to adapt the book into a mini series in some of her interviews on YouTube. In this article from The Guardian she discusses her difficulties with studio execs over how to do so.

[verywellthensigh]

Posted: 10/30/22 at 5:41pm

Must reading:

The Case Against the Trauma Plot by Parul Sehgal

https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2022/01/03/the-case-against-the-trauma-plot

[JasonC3]

Posted: 11/23/22 at 7:47am

From Time Out London:

"Next year, however, Van Hove’s ‘A Little Life’ makes its debut in English, in a production headed up by telly star James Norton as the story’s deeply troubled central character, Jude, along with Luke Thompson (Willem), Omari Douglas (JB), Zach Wyatt (Malcolm)."

‘A Little Life’ is at the Harold Pinter Theatre, Mar 25-Jun 18 2023, with a warm-up week at Richmond Theatre  March 14-18.

[Jordan Catalano]

Posted: 11/23/22 at 9:45am

Norton is such an exceptional actor, I can not wait to go see this. If you’re unfamiliar with him (as most are), check out this film from last year. One of the best and most depressing films I’ve seen in years 

Nowhere Special trailer

[Damiensta]

Posted: 11/23/22 at 10:07am

Jordan Catalano said: "Norton is such an exceptional actor, I can not wait to go see this. If you’re unfamiliar with him (as most are), check out this film from last year. One of the best and most depressing films I’ve seen in years

Nowhere Special trailer"

James Norton is one my faves working today

[JasonC3]

Posted: 8/17/23 at 8:09am

Trailer for the filmed version released.

https://youtu.be/hc_aUdXaTZw