| The Goat, or Who Is Sylvia? | |
|---|---|
 Book cover (Methuen) | |
| Written by | Edward Albee |
| Characters |
|
| Date premiered | March 10, 2002 |
| Place premiered | John Golden Theatre New York City, New York |
| Original language | English |
| Genre | Drama |
| Setting | Drama |
The Goat, or Who Is Sylvia? is a full-length play written in 2000 by Edward Albee which opened on Broadway in 2002. It won the 2002 Tony Award for Best Play, the 2002 Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Play, and was a finalist for the 2003 Pulitzer Prize for Drama.
The tale of a married, middle-aged architect, Martin, his wife Stevie, and their son Billy, whose lives crumble when Martin falls in love with a goat, the play focuses on the limits of an ostensibly liberal society. Through showing this family in crisis, Albee challenges audience members to question their own moral judgment of social taboos.
The play also features many language games and grammatical arguments in the middle of catastrophes and existential disputes between the characters. The name of the play refers to the song "Who Is Silvia?" from Shakespeare's play The Two Gentlemen of Verona . Proteus sings this song, hoping to woo Silvia. It is also referred to in Finding the Sun (1982), an earlier work of Albee.
It is Martin's 50th birthday. In his suburban living room, he and his wife Stevie prepare to be interviewed on television by their friend Ross. Martin seems distracted and cannot remember anything. Stevie casually asks Martin about a woman's business card in his pocket and his odd scent. Martin denies having an affair with a woman, but confesses to falling in love with a goat named Sylvia. Stevie laughs it off, thinking it is a joke. Stevie leaves when Ross arrives. Ross begins interviewing Martin, congratulating him for being the youngest man ever to win the Pritzker Prize and recently being chosen to design a multi-billion-dollar city. However, Ross soon becomes frustrated with Martin’s inability to concentrate on the interview. Martin confides that the reason for his absent-mindedness is his affair with Sylvia, which began during his search for a country home. Amazed that Martin could fall in love with anyone but Stevie, Ross asks repeatedly, "Who is Sylvia?" Martin reveals a photo of Sylvia and Ross screams that Sylvia is a goat.
Ross has written Stevie a letter regarding Martin's affair and Sylvia's identity. Stevie confronts Martin about this, with their son Billy also in the room. Billy is shocked and flees (throughout this scene, he enters and exits sporadically). Stevie recounts the normalcy of her life before she opened Ross's letter. She realizes that Martin was telling the truth in Scene 1 and that she was right to worry about the business card and the odd scent. The card belongs to a member of a support group for bestiality. Martin claims that people like him seek animal company as a coping mechanism. For him, Sylvia is not just an animal; she has a soul and reciprocates his love. As Martin tries to justify himself, Stevie breaks various objects and overturns furniture. Finally, she exits, vowing revenge.
Billy enters the ruined living room where Martin remains. Billy claims that Martin and Stevie are good people and are better than most of his classmates' parents. However, he begins crying once he realizes that Martin's bestiality has torn their once happy family apart beyond repair.
Overwhelmed with a sense of loss and love for his father, Billy embraces Martin and kisses him sexually on the mouth. Martin pushes Billy away just as Ross enters to witness the scene. Martin angrily defends both his son and himself. Ross says he received a call from Stevie saying Martin needed him. Ross and Martin spar over Ross's letter and how Martin's public image can be saved from disgrace.
Stevie then enters, dragging a dead goat. With directions from Ross to the farm where Sylvia was kept, she found and killed the goat, because she could not stand the idea that she and Sylvia loved Martin equally, and were loved as equally by him. The scene and play ends with a tableau as Ross freezes, Stevie remains emotionless, Martin breaks down in tears, and Billy quietly tries to address his parents.
Albee places parentheses around the play's subtitle: "Notes toward a definition of tragedy". The original Greek meaning of the word tragedy is "goat-song". [1] The play maintains Aristotle's six elements of a tragedy in addition to the three unities. [2] The play's resemblance to a Greek tragedy continues as Greek theater is linked to Dionysus. As the god of ritual madness, he inspires ecstasy that frees his followers from fears and subverts hegemony. Bestiality is considered taboo in contemporary society. Martin's relationship with Sylvia thus defies convention. Unlike the other members in the support group, Martin does not understand why bestiality is wrong when he practices it devoid of previous trauma.
On the other hand, Stevie resembles a maenad with her increasingly frenzied actions. [3] The play also alludes to the Eumenides. Before the interview starts, Ross hears "a kind of...rushing sound...wings, or something," [4] to which Martin replies, "It's probably the Eumenides." [4] The noise disappears and Martin corrects himself because "the Eumenides don't stop." [4] The allusion foreshadows Stevie's vow for vengeance, carried out to conclude the play.
The Goat is also a problem play. Albee questions, among other concepts, social morality in relation to taboos, the perception of female identity by contrasting Stevie to Sylvia, and the arbitrary nature of social standards and conventions by juxtaposing Martin's distaste for homosexuality with his bestiality. [5]
The play premiered on Broadway at the John Golden Theatre on March 10, 2002, and closed on December 15, 2002, after 309 performances and 23 previews. Directed by David Esbjornson, the cast featured Bill Pullman (Martin), Mercedes Ruehl (Stevie), Jeffrey Carlson (Billy), and Stephen Rowe (Ross). [6] On September 13, 2002, Bill Irwin took on the role of Martin, and Sally Field took the role of Stevie. [6] [7] [8]
The European premiere took place at Vienna's English Theatre in March to May 2003. Directed by Pam MacKinnon, the cast was Laurence Lau (Martin), Jurian Hughes (Stevie), Howard Nightingall (Ross), and Michael Zlabinger (Billy). [9]
The play ran in the UK at the Almeida Theatre in Islington from 3 February to 13 March 2004 and transferred to the West End at the Apollo Theatre on April 15, 2004, closing on August 7, 2004. [10] Directed by Anthony Page, the cast featured Jonathan Pryce (Martin), Kate Fahy (Stevie), Matthew Marsh (Ross), and Eddie Redmayne (Billy). [11]
The play was produced in NSW, Australia by the State Theatre of South Australia at the Seymour Centre (Sydney), from April 6 to May 7, 2006. Directed by Marion Potts, the cast featured William Zappa, Victoria Longley, Cameron Goodall and Pip Miller. [12]
The play was produced at TheaterWorks Hartford from April 2 to May 23, 2004, directed by Rob Ruggiero. [13]
The play was produced in Ottawa at the Great Canadian Theatre Company under the direction of Lorne Pardy, October 28 to November 14, 2004. The cast included Stewart Arnott as Martin, Dixie Seatle as Stevie, Peter Mooney as Billy, and Dennis Fitzgerald as Ross. [14]
A new production directed by Ian Rickson and starring Damian Lewis, Sophie Okonedo, Jason Hughes and Archie Madekwe opened at the Theatre Royal Haymarket in London's West End, in 2017. [15]
A production by Bulgarian director Javor Gardev, endorsed by Albee, premiered at the Ivan Vazov National Theatre of Bulgaria in 2009. The production received the Award of the Society of the Independent Theatre Critics that year. It remains in the repertoire of the National Theatre. [16]
A new production by Sydney Theatre Company opened at the Ros Packer Theatre, Sydney in March 2023, featuring Claudia Karvan, Yazeed Daher, Nathan Page, and Mark Saturno.
The play was a finalist for the 2003 Pulitzer Prize for Drama (won that year by Anna in the Tropics ). [17]
Awards
Nominations
Edward Franklin Albee III was an American playwright known for works such as The Zoo Story (1958), The Sandbox (1959), Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? (1962), A Delicate Balance (1966), and Three Tall Women (1994). Some critics have argued that some of his work constitutes an American variant of what Martin Esslin identified and named the Theater of the Absurd. Three of his plays won the Pulitzer Prize for Drama and two of his other works won the Tony Award for Best Play.
Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? is a play by Edward Albee first staged in October 1962. It examines the complexities of the marriage of middle-aged couple Martha and George. Late one evening, after a university faculty party, they receive unwitting younger couple Nick and Honey as guests, and draw them into their bitter and frustrated relationship.
Terrence McNally was an American playwright, librettist, and screenwriter. Described as "the bard of American theater" and "one of the greatest contemporary playwrights the theater world has yet produced," McNally was the recipient of five Tony Awards. He won the Tony Award for Best Play for Love! Valour! Compassion! and Master Class and the Tony Award for Best Book of a Musical for Kiss of the Spider Woman and Ragtime, and received the 2019 Tony Award for Lifetime Achievement. He was inducted into the American Theater Hall of Fame in 1996, and he also received the Dramatists Guild Lifetime Achievement Award in 2011 and the Lucille Lortel Lifetime Achievement Award. In 2018, he was inducted into the American Academy of Arts and Letters, the highest recognition of artistic merit in the United States. His other accolades included an Emmy Award, two Guggenheim Fellowships, a Rockefeller Grant, four Drama Desk Awards, two Lucille Lortel Awards, two Obie Awards, and three Hull-Warriner Awards.
Torch Song Trilogy is a collection of three plays by Harvey Fierstein rendered in three acts: International Stud, Fugue in a Nursery, and Widows and Children First! The story centers on Arnold Beckoff, a Jewish homosexual, drag queen, and torch singer who lives in New York City in the late 1970s and early 1980s. The four-hour play begins with a soliloquy in which he explains his cynical disillusionment with love.
Mercedes J. Ruehl is an American screen, stage, and television actress. She is the recipient of several accolades, including an Academy Award, a Golden Globe Award, a Tony Award, a Drama Desk Award, two Obie Awards, and two Outer Critics Circle Awards.
William Mills Irwin is an American actor, choreographer, clown, and comedian. He began as a vaudeville-style stage performer and has been noted for his contribution to the renaissance of American circus during the 1970s. He has made a number of appearances on film and television, and he won a Tony Award for his role in Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?. He also worked as a choreographer on Broadway and was nominated for the Tony Award for Best Choreography in 1989 for Largely New York. He is also known as Mr. Noodle on the Sesame Street segment Elmo's World, and he appeared in the Sesame Street film short Does Air Move Things?. He has regularly appeared as Dr. Peter Lindstrom on Law & Order: Special Victims Unit, and had a recurring role as "The Dick & Jane Killer" on CSI: Crime Scene Investigation. From 2017 to 2019, he appeared as Cary Loudermilk on the FX television series Legion.
Will Eno is an American playwright based in Brooklyn, New York. His play, Thom Pain was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in Drama in 2005. His play The Realistic Joneses appeared on Broadway in 2014, where it received a Drama Desk Special Award and was named Best Play on Broadway by USA Today, and best American play of 2014 by The Guardian. His play The Open House was presented Off-Broadway at the Signature Theatre in 2014 and won the Obie Award for Playwriting as well as other awards, and was on both TIME Magazine and Time Out New York 's Top Ten Plays of 2014.
Jeanine Tesori, known earlier in her career as Jeanine Levenson, is an American composer and musical arranger best known for her work in the theater. She is the most prolific and honored female theatrical composer in history, with five Broadway musicals and six Tony Award nominations. She won the 1999 Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Music in a Play for Nicholas Hytner's production of Twelfth Night at Lincoln Center, the 2004 Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Music for Caroline, or Change, the 2015 Tony Award for Best Original Score for Fun Home, making them the first female writing team to win that award, and the 2023 Tony Award for Best Original Score for Kimberly Akimbo. She was named a Pulitzer Prize for Drama finalist twice for Fun Home and Soft Power.
Lost in Yonkers is a play by Neil Simon. The play won the 1991 Pulitzer Prize for Drama.
Three Tall Women is a two-act play by Edward Albee that premiered at Vienna's English Theatre in 1991. The three unnamed women, one in her 90s, one in her 50s, and one in her 20s, are referred to in the script as A, B, and C. The character of A, the oldest woman, is based in part on Albee's mother. In the first act, B is the caretaker and C is the lawyer for A, while in the second act they become personifications of A from earlier in her life.
Frances Hussey Sternhagen was an American actress. Sternhagen was known as a character actress who appeared on- and off-Broadway, in movies, and on television for over six decades. She received numerous accolades including two Tony Awards, a Drama Desk Award and a Saturn Award, as well as nominations for three Primetime Emmy Awards.
Michael Cristofer is an American actor, playwright and filmmaker. He received the Pulitzer Prize for Drama and the Tony Award for Best Play for The Shadow Box in 1977. From 2015 to 2019, he played the role of Phillip Price in the television series Mr. Robot.
Irene Worth, CBE, born Harriett Elizabeth Abrams, was an American stage and screen actress who became one of the leading stars of the British and American theatre. She pronounced her given name with three syllables: "I-REE-nee".
David Esbjornson is a director and producer who has worked throughout the United States in regional theatres and on Broadway, and has established strong and productive relationships with some of the profession's top playwrights, actors, and companies. Esbjornson was the artistic director of Seattle Repertory Theatre in Seattle, Washington, but left that position in summer 2008.
Emily Betsy Mann is an American director, playwright and screenwriter. She served as the artistic director and resident playwright of the McCarter Theatre Center from 1990 to 2020.
The Play About the Baby is a play by Edward Albee.
They Knew What They Wanted is a 1924 play written by Sidney Howard. The play premiered on Broadway in 1924 and had three Broadway revivals as well as a London production.
William Pullman is an American actor. After graduating with a Master of Fine Arts degree in theater, he was an adjunct professor at Montana State University before deciding to pursue acting. He made his film debut in Ruthless People (1986), and starred in Spaceballs (1987), The Accidental Tourist (1988), Sleepless in Seattle (1993), While You Were Sleeping (1995), Casper (1995), Independence Day (1996), Lost Highway (1997), and Lake Placid (1999). He has appeared frequently on television, usually in TV films. Starting in the 2000s he has also acted in miniseries and regular series, such as Torchwood (2011), starring roles in 1600 Penn (2012–13) and The Sinner (2017–2021). In 2021, he had a recurring role in the miniseries Halston.
Pam MacKinnon is an American theatre director. She has directed for the stage Off-Broadway, on Broadway and in regional theatre. She won the Obie Award for Directing and received a Tony Award nomination, Best Director, for her work on Clybourne Park. In 2013 she received the Tony Award for Best Direction of a Play for a revival of Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? She was named artistic director of American Conservatory Theater in San Francisco, California on January 23, 2018.
Daryl Roth is an American theatre producer who has produced over 90 productions on and off Broadway. Most often serving as a co-producer or investor, Roth has also been a lead producer of Broadway shows such as Kinky Boots, Indecent, Sylvia, It Shoulda Been You, and The Normal Heart.
| Characters |
|  |
|---|---|---|
| Sources |
| |
| Theatrical adaptations |
| |
| Screen adaptations |
| |
| Related |
| |
| International | |
|---|---|
| National | |
