From a small newspaper item about a teenage boy who inexplicably blinded a stable of horses, playwright Peter Shaffer spun a tale of psychology and mythology, of passion and pain, a detective story that seeks the teen’s motives but becomes just as interested in the demons plaguing the doctor who tries to wean him to normalcy. The play is Equus – the Latin word for … [Read more...]
Weekend picks: May 19-20
Film: While The Avengers and Deadpool 2 duke it out for the box office booty, see instead a small, human unconventional love story with no superheroes. It is called Anything – OK, a terrible, generic title – but it concerns a recent widower in Mississippi (John Carroll Lynch) who moves to Los Angeles at the urging of his meddlesome sister (Maura Tierney), and settles in tawdry … [Read more...]
Dramaworks closes out season with Shaffer’s powerful ‘Equus’
Peter Shaffer’s 1973 stylized drama Equus takes the form of a detective story, as child psychiatrist Martin Dysart tries to learn what caused 17-year-old Alan Strang to brutally blind a group of horses. With heightened theatricality, it becomes not a whodunnit, but a whydunnit. And in the course of trying to understand the boy’s motives, Dr. Dysart wrestles with his own … [Read more...]