Equus

[Currer Bell]

Freaky play or what?

[mortalterror]

Actually, no. It's a very very good play by the gentleman who brought us Amadeus. There's nothing graphic or obscene. The subject matter is shocking but the treatment is tame. The great film director Sidney Lumet made a movie out of it in 1977 starring Richard Burton, who gives a stellar performance almost on par with his earlier work in Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?. I'd say the two plays are comparable. Both are powerful, disturbing, insightful treatments which sparkle with linguistic fireworks.

[SirRaustusBear]

I agree with mortalterror, when people talk about Equus it tends to be about the weird horse stuff but it is really a great play. The relationship between Alan and the psychiatrist and the questions about conformity that are brought up are brilliant.

[LitNetIsGreat]

Yes I would agree it's a great play, saw a good performance of it as well. I also used it for an exam on psychoanalysis which it is obviously good for. (:)Got a good mark.)

[shortstoryfan]

I took a theatre class one semester where I did a monologue from Equus. I read the play to prepare and fell in love with it, because the language is like poetry.

[Phranchesskah]

I haven't read the play, but I saw it performed when it was in the West End with Richard Griffiths and Daniel Radcliffe, and I have to say it was stunning. I wouldn't describe it as freaky at all.

[mayneverhave]

I read this play a couple semesters ago for a 20th Century British Literature class.
Quite good.

[Currer Bell]

I've read several of Peter Schaffer's plays, but Equus blew my mind. The writing style is like reading poetry, and the topics were complex and ....mind-boggling. Don't get me wrong when I said the play was freaky. I'm a fan. It is just a play that will haunt you once you have finished it.

[joseph90ie]

I first saw the Richard Burton film version of that play, and then read it. I remember enjoying both, though the film is the more vivid experience in my memory - which surely is testament to the quality of the play! The passion and vulnerability of a young man who worships, exalts something is...I dunno...great film, though.

[Farah786]

excellent play....watched the movie? How wow is Richard Burton?

[Jozanny]

I have never seen Equus staged, though I would like to. I suspect it is a difficult play to produce and direct well. I recently saw the Burton version again, twice, and I am not sure I agree with mortal entirely, although Peter Firth is now closer to Burton's age then, and he is stuck doing character acting on what the Brits consider to be contemporary spy thrillers. He plays the boy well, I mean, and I wonder if he still has his range.

I am not sure about the author's intent either, but it is a complex topic to tackle, and I haven't made coffee yet, and so forth, but I agree it is all very powerful stuff.

[Farah786]

Peter Schaffer's idea of a play was just his own exaggerated thoughts from a real life story he was told by a friend during a dinner party drive......of a young man ripping the eyes out and blinding many horses one night with a pick axe (I think that was the tool, from my poor little memory) :-)........
the rest of the play is his own beautiful making......

I thought it was great.....and most of all I liked Mr Burton's acting......

[Currer Bell]

Not to "beat a dead horse" on this topic, but I reread the play a few years ago and found that I do not like it. I still find the writing style good...but I do not think I paid much attention the first reading to a lot of the very dark/graphic elements represented in the play. So, to change my own mind, I retract my previously posted comments of commendation.

[kelby_lake]

What's wrong with dark?

[Kafka's Crow]

Peter Shaffer and his dark world, I was in love with all this senseless destruction about 20 years ago. I think I have a video of Daniel Radcliffe's Equus somewhere, should dig it out. Still The Five Finger Exercise used to be my favorite. I think he wrote The Royal Hunt of the Sun as well. Senseless destruction all around. If you must destroy something, pick something great and beautiful, even Mozart is not out of bound when it comes to senseless destruction.

[byquist]

I saw Leonard Nimoy do the Doc, but missed Burton. This is a heavy play about the psyche -- how people (sometimes and under certain circumstances) think. Religion gets some uncalled-for bad rap, with that picture on Alan's wall supposedly influencing him, kind of a weak rationale, but to watch the Doc try to figure Alan out (and envy him) is great. Dysart is intrigued more in the horse than the kid, right from his opening statement, as I recall. And late he says that the bit is in his (Dysart's) mouth "and it never comes out."

One might ask what in life gets itself in one's own mouth and reigns, impossible to extricate. What gets a hold of one's thinking that results in particular actions. Equus is a real psychological study, plus those horses creating a ruckus every half hour or so. Both education and entertainment.

[cacian]

Freaky play or what?

what was freaky about it?
to be honest I find the title and the spelling of EQUUS quite annoying to read..plus this is the only time I have come across a word that begin with QU and follows with another U.
Whoever came out with this word must have suffered acute dyslexism of another kind.
I mean it makes want to kick the U out of it..
What does the word mean? All I know is it might derive from Equestrian which is related to horses.

[kelby_lake]

It's Latin: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Equus_(genus)

[cacian]

It's Latin: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Equus_(genus)

Thanks kelby_lake :)