Literature Network » Frances Hodgson Burnett

Theater; `Secret Garden': Unfertile Territory

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From: The Washington Post
Date: 19921228
Author:Lloyd Rose

Wrapped in layers and layers of Victorian-era fancy paper, "The Secret Garden," which opened last night at the Kennedy Center Opera House, is an empty box underneath the trappings. Based on the classic children's book of the same name, this musical adaptation jettisons what story there was and replaces it with some underdeveloped melodrama and lots of pretty stagecraft.

Frances Hodgson Burnett's novel tells the story of spoiled little Mary who, orphaned and sent to live with her reclusive uncle Archibald on the Yorkshire moors, grows up. In the process, she brings life to all around her - ...

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