http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OGe37j8NIn4&feature=player_detailpage#t=349

As far as I can work out, this section of the play - a burlesque of "An Importance of Being Earnest" - isn't actually part of Tom Stoppard's original script, but since the 1990s it appears to be common to perform this version (also stripping and toy trains, apparently). I can't be sure whether it was Stoppard's idea (the play has certainly been officially revised at least once) or just some inspired director...

.... but surely it must be tempting for a producer here to consider a messier, and perhaps ruder, version? I don't know if the staging is copyrighted, but surely Oscar Wilde's quoted lines can't be?

Skip to 5.55 if you don't want to watch the play and just want to get to the messy stuff.

Some photos from other productions:

http://www.houstontheatre.com/travest1.jpg

http://www.baystreet.org/3e/uploaded/JuliaMotykaEmilyTrask.jpg

Drat, that link was supposed to fast forward straight on

You know, I've seen that 1st pic a bunch of times, and it looks like great potential, but we can't see her face. I've never seen any other pics from this staging, or any video from it. So I want to like it, but ultimately it's disappointing. Has anyone ever seen more pics or a vid from this? (*not* a complaint about you posting it)

Now the 2nd pic: This is fabulous! I've never seen that one before! I love the dresses that the two women are wearing, and the fact that the pied lady is facing us and we can see her face in all its messy glory! I also like how the other lady is smirking/laughing about it!

Thanks so much for posting the second pic, nativehugh!

Norman

Glad you enjoyed the pic, Norman Mabeld! That's Julia Motyka as Gwendolyn...here's a pic of her face sans pie:
http://www.playbill.com/images/photo/f/r/fratti200.jpg

Yeah, I checked her out, trying to find more pics. She's lovely, isn't she? :lovestruck:

The other actress is also very pretty!

Norman

A shame the only video we have is of that rather underwhelming food melee and not what appears to be scripted as a tit-for-tat pie in the face bit. Not to knock the OP, since this thread has delivered and his intentions were in the right place, but the guy in that video is wearing fucking goggles for crying out loud. Ugh.

Now, those pictures, I've seen that first one and always wanted to see the aftermath. The newest picture with the post-pied girl looks to be a near perfect hit on an attractive target, the first of several given the table full of pies sitting right there.

Maybe we'll get lucky and someday something else will surface for our viewing pleasure...

I *thought* there was something odd about him, but the video quality is such that he's so indistinct I didn't spot it. (And it begs the question, if the two main characters in the scene don't need goggles, why does he? *)




* The only serious suggestion I can give is that the play must give the two ladies space for a costume change at thsi point, whereas he's probably the only person dressing the set, and needs contact lenses, and can't spare time to go off and clean himself off and change them.