Thursday, January 03, 2013

Play review - "Candida" (1894) by George Bernard Shaw

I was curious to read this because Garson Kanin mentioned it in one of his books as a great Shaw female role, and a possible vehicle for Katherine Hepburn. Candida is sensible, smart, funny, beautiful, loyal and so on - so much so that you never really feel she even comes close to leaving her clergyman husband for Marchbanks. This character, the young and in love aristocrat, is actually more interesting a character than Candida - who is more of a star role than a character, and is passive a lot of the time, for all that the men pant over her. (I had a similar problem with Major Barbara too).

Still, it's not hard to imagine with the right three actors this would be a treat to watch. Not major Shaw but it was worth reading.

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