Although the story is about a fictional extended family living in Vienna, this decades-spanning, compact epic was inspired by parts of Stoppard’s own family history, a saga starting not in Vienna but in the Czech Republic’s Zlin, where he was born in 1937.Īn excerpt in the program from a 1999 article Stoppard wrote for Talk magazine reveals that he has recycled and repurposed here some names of his own relatives, a piercing anecdote about a scar, and a chilling call-and-response originally between himself and an elderly relative about what happened to the many unknown names she wrote down for him on a family tree. “It’s like a second death to lose your name in a family album,” says Grandma Emilia (Caroline Gruber) in the first scene, words that darkly foreshadow the many deaths and losses to come. That mystery about who these elegantly coiffed but anonymous folk might be turns out to be central to the text, which hinges on the volatility of memory. But with its relatable meditation on pre- and post-Holocaust secular Jewish identity, survivors’ guilt and the fragility of memory, it might just end up being one of the most accessible and commercially successful theatrical works from the latter part of his career.ĭirected by fellow playwright Patrick Marber ( Closer), this production is set to run through June 13, but will surely travel well beyond the Wyndham’s Theatre in London’s West End.įrom the moment the house bell tolls, advising the audience to take their seats, grainy old photographs are projected onto a scrim at the front of the stage, showing images of unidentified people in turn-of-the-century dress, faces from some stranger’s book of the dead. Glenda Jackson, Feisty Two-Time Oscar Winner, Dies at 87Īrguably, Leopoldstadt is less stringently cerebral than some of Stoppard’s most acclaimed works (see Travesties, Arcadia), and less ludic and Pirandellian than the plays that really built his brand ( Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead, The Real Inspector Hound).
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