The Real Thing

by Tom Stoppard

Overview

The play begins with Max and Charlotte, a couple whose marriage seems about to rupture. But nothing one sees on a stage is the real thing, and some things are less real than others. Charlotte is an actress who has been appearing in a play about marriage by her husband, Henry. Max, her leading man, is also married to an actress, Annie. Both marriages are at the point of rupture because Henry and Annie have fallen in love. But is it the real thing?

In The Real Thing, Tom Stoppard combines his characteristically brilliant wordplay and wit with flashes of insight that illuminate the nature—and the mystery—of love, creating a multi-toned play that challenges the mind while searching out the innermost secrets of the heart.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780571125296
Publisher:	Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Publication date:	04/17/2000
Edition description:	Broadway Edition
Pages:	112
Sales rank:	653,351
Product dimensions:	5.00(w) x 8.00(h) x 0.20(d)

About the Author

Tom Stoppard's other work includes Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead (Tony Award), Jumpers, Travesties (Tony Award), Night and Day, After Margritte, The Real Thing (Tony Award), Enter a Free Man, Hapgood, Arcadia (Evening Standard Award, The Oliver Award and the Critics Award), Dalliance and Undiscovered Country, Indian Ink (a stage adaptation of his own play, In the Native State) and The Invention of Love.

His radio plays include The Dissolution of Dominic Boot, 'M' is for Moon Among Other Things, If You're Glad I'll Be Frank, Albert's Bridge (Italia Prize), Where Are They Now?, Artist Descending A Staircase, The Dog It Was That Died and In the Native State (Sony Award).

His work for television includes Professional Foul (Bafta Award, Broadcasting Press Guild Award). His film credits include Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead which he also directed (winner of the Golden Lion, Venice Film Festival).

Editorial Reviews

[The Real Thing] is about both love and art, and it is wise, witty, and astonishing through and through...Enthralling.” —Alastair Macaulay, Financial Times on the London production

“You couldn't ask for a more deeply felt, or more deeply affecting, drama about love than this...The Real Thing is indeed the genuine article—a play of strength, grace, melancholy and wit.” —Charles Spencer, The Daily Telegraph on the London production

“When it comes to putting erotic love in its place, no contemporary English playwright has done so with such illuminating rigour or eloquence as Tom Stoppard.” —Nicholas De Jongh, Evening Standard on the London production

From the Publisher

When it comes to putting erotic love in its place, no contemporary English playwright has done so with such illuminating rigour or eloquence as Tom Stoppard.

Evening Standard on the London production Nicholas De Jongh

You couldn't ask for a more deeply felt, or more deeply affecting, drama about love than this...The Real Thing is indeed the genuine article—a play of strength, grace, melancholy and wit.

The Daily Telegraph on the London production Charles Spencer

[The Real Thing] is about both love and art, and it is wise, witty, and astonishing through and through...Enthralling.

Financial Times on the London production Alastair Macaulay

A talented ensemble cast brings to life Stoppard's classic play featuring the loves and loves lost of playwright Henry; his wife, Charlotte; an actor named Max; and his activist wife, Annie. Featuring a play within a play, this production is superbly performed if slightly confusing in audiobook format—it's often difficult to keep track of who is speaking and to keep track of the endlessly reconfiguring relationships. Henry searches for meaning both in art and romantic relationships as he attempts to write a play about his love for Annie and begrudgingly ghostwrites a play for Brodie, an incarcerated soldier and talentless, aspiring playwright. Templeman shines as Henry, perfectly capturing his wit, bravado and pathos. With terrific performances from the supporting cast, this audiobook will delight Stoppard fans and theater lovers. (Aug.)

Publishers Weekly

Wordsmith Tom Stoppard's semiautobiographical romantic comedy wowed audiences on the West End and Broadway. This superbly performed audio version, recorded before an appreciative studio audience, does the same. Henry, a playwright known for his witty and cynical oeuvre, is in real life a romantic—an insecure one at that. The infidelities of Annie, the actress he loves, and her incomprehensible support for a thuggish Scottish radical force him to reexamine his idea of the "real thing" he yearns for. Particularly in the mouths of Simon Templeman, as Henry, and Carolyn Seymour, as Henry's first wife, the dialogue sparkles. As Annie, Joanne Whalley does a serviceable job but has two problems. She occasionally steps on Henry's laughs, and she doesn't vocally project the appeal that makes Henry's predicament so acute. Y.R. Winner of AudioFile Earphones Award © AudioFile 2009, Portland, Maine

SEPTEMBER 2009 - AudioFile