Theatre Royal. The very name summons up something of grandeur and eloquence. And it was. Hosted by Laurence Olivier, these big-name productions also included the creme de la creme of acting talents from John Gielgud, Ralph Richardson, and Orson Welles to Trevor Howard, Michael Redgrave and Olivier himself. They were based on works by the worlds' leading authors, among them Charles Dickens, Henry James, Oscar Wilde and Anton Chekhov. These are but a few of whose company we shall be keeping as we raise the curtain on our first instalment of theatrical history.
Somewhere in shadowy post-war Vienna, where everyone has something to sell on the black market, lurks the third man who witnessed the murder of Harry Lime. Novelist Holly Martins is haunted by the death of his friend. His search for the killer makes electrifying drama, in this witty and sophisticated audio adaptation of the Graham Greene classic.
An L.A. Theatre Works full-cast performance featuring Ian Abercrombie, Rosalind Ayres, Ethan Glazer, Kelsey Grammer, John Mahoney, Wolf Muser, Barry Philips, Andreas Renell, Bettina Spier, Slav Troyan, John Vickery, Tom Virtue and Nobert Weisser.
Rollo Martins, a writer of Westerns, arrives in post-war Vienna to visit his old school friend Harry Lime, and to his growing horror becomes inextricably involved in the mystery surrounding Lime's black-marketeering. This is the original book which Graham Greene and director Carol Reed subsequently turned into the classic Hollywood film starring Orson Welles.
Alden Pyle, an idealistic young American, is sent to Vietnam to promote democracy amidst the intrigue and violence of the French war with the Vietminh, while his friend, Fowler, a cynical foreign correspondent, looks on. Fowler's mistress, a beautiful native girl, creates a catalyst for jealousy and competition between the men and a cultural clash resulting in bloodshed and deep misgivings.
Written in 1955 prior to the Vietnam conflict, The Quiet American foreshadows the events leading up to the Vietnam conflict. Questions surrounding the moral ambiguity of the involvement of the United States in foreign countries are as relevant today as they were fifty years ago.
Graham Greene explores corruption and atonement in this penetrating novel set in 1930s Mexico during the era of Communist religious persecutions. As revolutionaries determine to stamp out the evils of the church through violence, the last Roman Catholic priest is on the lam, hunted by a police lieutenant. Despite his own sense of worthlessness-he is a heavy drinker and has fathered an illegitimate child-he is determined to continue to function as a priest until captured. He is contrasted with Padre Jose, a priest who has accepted marriage and embodies humiliation.
A Christian parable pitting God and religion against 20th-century materialism, The Power and the Glory is considered by many, including the author himself, to be Greene's best work.
"As brilliantly written as it is magnificently conceived."-Chicago Sun
London in the 1950s. A mysterious house, home to a family that has seen better days, will not yield its secrets. And a love affair turns to tragedy... Greene, one of the foremost writers of the 20th century, based the play on his own passionate but doomed affairs, and his conflicted view of Catholicism.
Includes an interview with one of the world’s foremost biographers of Graham Greene, Dr. Norman Sherry.
An L.A. Theatre Works full-cast performance featuring W. Morgan Sheppard, Julian Sands, Kirsten Potter, Samantha Robson, Jane Carr and Judy Geeson.
