Summary: In 1925 Luigi Pirandello brought his troupe to England as part of a worldwide tour. This program re-creates one day in London as "The Einstein of the Theater" watches his plays and, away from the footlights, confronts the paradoxical nature of his life. Portions of Six Characters in Search of an Author; Henry IV; Right You Are, If You Think You Are; and The Rules of the Game are meticulously...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2009
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Summary: For biographer Michael Holroyd, playwright George Bernard Shaw is practically an alter ego. Using archival footage and Holroyd's painstaking detective work, this intriguing program questions the extent to which Shaw's life and art fed upon each other, addressing issues including the effects of the triangle between his father, his mother, and Vandeleur Lee on his plays, as seen in Misalliance...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2005
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Summary: Henrik Ibsen scrutinized and interpreted human hearts and minds in such a manner as to prompt Sigmund Freud to create a typology based on the dramatist's principal characters. Yet the evidence of Ibsen's life argues that he himself lived with a dual nature that went largely unreconciled. This program seeks to understand the man known as "The Sphinx" by tracing his travels, examining excerpts...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2006
View online at AVOD
Summary: Second only to Shakespeare, Henrik Ibsen is the most-performed playwright in the world. This program, as much a tribute to the art of theater as to the immortal Ibsen, reveals a perennial fascination with Norway's master playwright. Excerpts from A Doll's House, Peer Gynt, and other productions captured on film in the United States, Canada, Britain, Norway, Denmark, Germany, Serbia, Iran,...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2005
View online at AVOD
Summary: This program, narrated by Ibsen biographer Michael Meyer, charts the development of Henrik Ibsen's style over four periods: his early years of failure; his epic dramas; his sociological plays, such as A Doll's House, Ghosts, and Rosmersholm; and his final plays, including Hedda Gabler, The Master Builder, and Little Eyolf, in which he dealt with the dark interior of the human soul. Televised...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2005
View online at AVOD
Summary: Shakespeare's tale of love, betrayal, and retribution is perhaps best known for the tormented and implacable character of Shylock. This adaptation of The Merchant of Venice, directed by University of Cambridge visiting scholar Douglas Morse, focuses on Portia's story as well as the play's essential humor-aspects frequently given short shrift in other productions. Filmed in an intimate,...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2009
View online at AVOD
Summary: When Tim Supple directed the filming of Twelfth Night, he was a stickler for sticking to the words as the Bard penned them. Everything else, though, was up for grabs as he and screenwriter Andrew Bannerman shifted and intercut scenes and in general translated the play into the all-encompassing language of film. In this program, members of the cast and crew use snippets of the screenplay to...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2006