- Paperback: 192 pages
- Publisher: Methuen Drama; Student Manual/Study Guide edition (July 1 2008)
- Language: English
- ISBN-10: 0713687568
- ISBN-13: 978-0713687569
- Product Dimensions: 19.8 x 13.1 x 1.2 cm
- Shipping Weight: 159 g
- Average Customer Review: 3.0 out of 5 stars See all reviews (1 customer review)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: #125,179 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
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Product Details |
Product Description
Review
“A simply marvelous play, painfully funny and passionately serious; a hilarious social documentary;
a fairy-tale with a quizzical, half-happy ending.”—Sunday Times of London
Product Description
A Methuen Student Edition of the revised version of Willy Russell’s classic play, with full introduction, commentary, notes on the text, and questions.
Willy Russell lives in Liverpool and is one of the most successful contemporary playwrights whose works are studied in schools and colleges. His plays include Stags and Hens, Educating Rita, Blood Brothers, Our Day Out, and Shirley Valentine.
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Most helpful customer reviews
3.0 out of 5 stars
Ouch! I resemble that remark!,
By
Ce commentaire est de: Educating Rita (Paperback)
I'm exactly Willy Russell's age. I wonder how much of Willy he's invested in Frank, the male half of this 2 character play. There's more of me in him than I am comfortable exploring. That's unfortunate because I've been assigned the first scene of Educating Rita as an acting class exercise. It's quite a good play, really; better than 3 stars perhaps but not quite worthy of 4. It's a polemic from 1980 in which Russell unburdened himself of some of his views about the working class; that alone seems a little quaint from this side of the Pond and the Millenial divide. The fact is that Rita is a wonderful character, a true heroine. She is a classic Shavian philistine on her way to becoming a realist which as any student of Shaw knows is the highest form to which humans may aspire. I wish I was meant to play Rita. Unfortunately, Frank feels more like a foil than a character, at least after 2 readings of the play. Ben Kingsley said, after Nasty Beast, that you have to find something in even the most despicable character which you love in order to play him. Good luck. Frank is pathetic. He lives behind walls designed to protect him from having to live. The walls of academia, for one, the walls of the pub, for another. Finally there are the walls of books in his University office behind which he hides his whiskey bottles. So fifty-something Frank meets twenty-six year-old Rita. Although he is a catalyst in her great awakening, he fails to have one of his own. Unlike Bill Murray's character in Lost in Translation, he lacks the insight and the decency to understand that this relationship, regardless of how much it does for him, simply cannot be. As a result the play seems to end on a very hollow, sour note. Or am I missing something?
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews on Amazon.com (beta) Amazon.com:
4.0 out of 5 stars (6 customer reviews) 4 of 4 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars
You've seen the movie now read the play...,
By Kali "bengaligirl" - Published on Amazon.com
Ce commentaire est de: Educating Rita (Paperback)
Another thrift shop bargain that I picked up by chance. Like most people I've seen the movie with Michael Caine and Julie Walters but I wanted to see what they "play" version was like with only "Rita" and "Frank" seen at any given moment.It is actually quite enlightening, the discourse is perky and colourful and the other characters we verbally "meet" in the play are only one dimensional in the sense they are talked about but never seen by the audience. However this does not make them any less real and we soon start to believe in their existence even though we never get to see them in the flesh. This particular Longman book is quite good in that it gives a sturdy and interesting preface from Willy Russell himself, along with a fairly comprehensive glossary at the end and a reasonable study programme, rather basic if you are a graduate student but still useful for anyone who is a literature buff, be they beginner or expert. Not bad for a book that cost less than a dollar is all I can say! 4 of 5 people found the following review helpful
3.0 out of 5 stars
Ouch! I resemble that remark!,
By Laurence K. Cantor "El Casey" - Published on Amazon.com
Ce commentaire est de: Educating Rita (Paperback)
I'm exactly Willy Russell's age. I wonder how much of Willy he's invested in Frank, the male half of this 2 character play. There's more of me in him than I am comfortable exploring. That's unfortunate because I've been assigned the first scene of Educating Rita as an acting class exercise. It's quite a good play, really; better than 3 stars perhaps but not quite worthy of 4. It's a polemic from 1980 in which Russell unburdened himself of some of his views about the working class; that alone seems a little quaint from this side of the Pond and the Millenial divide. The fact is that Rita is a wonderful character, a true heroine. She is a classic Shavian philistine on her way to becoming a realist which as any student of Shaw knows is the highest form to which humans may aspire. I wish I was meant to play Rita. Unfortunately, Frank feels more like a foil than a character, at least after 2 readings of the play. Ben Kingsley said, after Nasty Beast, that you have to find something in even the most despicable character which you love in order to play him. Good luck. Frank is pathetic. He lives behind walls designed to protect him from having to live. The walls of academia, for one, the walls of the pub, for another. Finally there are the walls of books in his University office behind which he hides his whiskey bottles. So fifty-something Frank meets twenty-six year-old Rita. Although he is a catalyst in her great awakening, he fails to have one of his own. Unlike Bill Murray's character in Lost in Translation, he lacks the insight and the decency to understand that this relationship, regardless of how much it does for him, simply cannot be. As a result the play seems to end on a very hollow, sour note. Or am I missing something?
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars
Script Plus Bonus Information,
By Jim K "Jim in Boston" - Published on Amazon.com
Achat Amazon vérifié(Quest-ce que cest?)
Ce commentaire est de: Educating Rita (Paperback)
This version of Educating Rita is quite extensive. My wife and I saw the play recently and I wanted to review some of the dialogue to get more from it. This edition contains all the dialogue, stage directions, etc that you'd expect plus a lot of background information on the playwright. Good value and good information.
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