The Morgan Arts Council presents Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? for four more performances – Wednesday through Saturday of this week – October 23 to October 26 at the Ice House in Berkeley Springs, West Virginia.
Book online here or call 304-258-2300 to reserve seats.
Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? examines the complexities of the marriage of a middle-aged couple, Martha and George.
Late one evening, after a university faculty party, they receive an unwitting younger couple, Nick and Honey, as guests, and draw them into their bitter and frustrated relationship.
“We the audience often can’t tell whether George and Martha are sparring for fun or sparring for real,” director Tom Brooks told Russell Mokhiber of This Week in Morgan County. “And we don’t know what it’s about. Is it about alcoholism? Not really. Is it about abuse? I guess to a certain level. Not physical abuse. But the thing is – George and Martha love each other. Which may not be apparent at first.”
“There is a younger couple who come to the house. There are only four people in the cast. The older couple and the younger couple. The play takes place in real time, from just after 2 o’clock in the morning to just after dawn.”
Brooks says that the play was written in 1962 and at that time “people didn’t talk that way to each other.”
“That wasn’t the norm. The norm was the American dream. We’ve got a little house in the suburbs and we are pleasant to each other. Well, George and Martha don’t follow those rules.”
The play was written by Edward Albee and it was his breakthrough play. Why was it so successful?
“A critic, who attended the opening night was listening to people during the first and second intermissions talking to each other. And the people were saying – people don’t talk to each other this way. Nobody behaves like this. But no one left. They all went back into the theater for the next excursion into the darkness to find the truth.”
Brooks says the play is a cautionary tale.
“We like to see the struggle and survival,” Brooks said. “People like stories of survival. George and Martha are lost. How do they find their way? And do they? At the end of the day, you will have to decide what happens.”