The Imaginary Invalid - Couverture souple

Moliere

Couverture souple

ISBN 10 : 0881456098 ISBN 13 : 9780881456097

Editeur : Broadway Play Publishing, Incorporated, 2016

Synopsis

Love is funny. Love is trickery. Love is … smelly? It's certainly a merry-go-round of misplaced desires and hidden agendas in Constance Congdon's fresh and hilarious new take on Molière's skewering of a health-care crisis from an entirely different century. To quell his growing pile of medical bills, Monsieur Argan, a chronic hypochondriac, will go to any length to marry his daughter off to a doctor. Of course, his daughter has other ideas. A narcotic cocktail of romantic triangles, double entendres, and mistaken identities ensues, promising to leave you gasping, giggling, and possibly … in stitches.

"Molière penned his final play, the slapstick comedy THE IMAGINARY INVALID more than 450 years ago, and it is not only amazing that this lesser-known play still stands the test of time, but how visionary this comedy, currently being seen in Constance Congdon's new adaptation at the American Conservatory Theatre, has become. Or should we really be surprised in this age of plentiful medication — as doctors scribble prescriptions faster than it takes to gulp a handful of pills down with a glass of water — that THE IMAGINARY INVALID feels as relevant today as it did when healers swore by snake oil and holy water rather than Nexium and Zoloft? Moreover, Congdon has folded in a healthy dose of present-day nuances and innuendos, as well as beefed up the plot. The result is an entertaining and jovial romp … The great Frenchman's last contribution to the world's stage — he died onstage while playing Argan — proves that time has stood still when it comes to the eternal nature of the hypochondriac." —TheaterMania.com, Tiffany Maleshefski

"Lean, clean and comically bent … a bright evening of amusement and occasional hilarity." —Variety, Dennis Harvey

A propos du livre

Biographie de l'auteur

Jean Baptiste Poquelin, better known by his stage name of Moliere, stands without a rival at the head of French comedy. Born at Paris in January, 1622, where his father held a position in the royal household, he was educated at the Jesuit College de Clermont, and for some time studied law, which he soon abandoned for the stage. His life was spent in Paris and in the provinces, acting, directing performances, managing theaters, and writing plays. He had his share of applause from the king and from the public; but the satire in his comedies made him many enemies, and he was the object of the most venomous attacks and the most impossible slanders. Nor did he find much solace at home; for he married unfortunately, and the unhappiness that followed increased the bitterness that public hostility had brought into his life. On February 17, 1673, while acting in "La Malade Imaginaire," the last of his masterpieces, he was seized with illness and died a few hours later. The first of the greater works of Moliere was "Les Precieuses Ridicules," produced in 1659. In this brilliant piece Moliere lifted French comedy to a new level and gave it a new purpose—the satirizing of contemporary manners and affectations by frank portrayal and criticism. In the great plays that followed, "The School for Husbands" and "The School for Wives," "The Misanthrope" and "The Hypocrite" (Tartuffe), "The Miser" and "The Hypochondriac," "The Learned Ladies," "The Doctor in Spite of Himself," "The Citizen Turned Gentleman," and many others, he exposed mercilessly one after another the vices and foibles of the day. His characteristic qualities are nowhere better exhibited than in "Tartuffe." Compared with such characterization as Shakespeare's, Moliere's method of portraying life may seem to be lacking in complexity; but it is precisely the simplicity with which creations like Tartuffe embody the weakness or vice they represent that has given them their place as universally recognized types of human nature.

Présentation de l'éditeur

The Imaginary Invalid (French: Le malade imaginaire) is a three-act comédie-ballet by the French playwright Molière. It is the last comedy written by Molière. He was very ill, nearly dying, at the time he wrote it. It was first acted at the Palais Royal Theatre, on February 10, 1673. Molière acted the part of Argan.

Détails de l'édition

• Éditeur: Broadway Play Publishing, Incorporated
• Date d'édition: 2016
• Langue: anglais
• ISBN 10: 0881456098
• ISBN 13: 9780881456097
• Reliure: Broché
• Nombre de pages: 80
• Coordonnées du fabricant: Manufactured by Amazon on behalf of the author; https://www.amazon.fr/hz/contact-us; ; c/o Amazon Media EU S.à.r.l., 38 Avenue John F. Kennedy; Luxembourg; L-1855; Luxembourg