134 posts
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Post by romeo94 on Feb 26, 2018 20:36:18 GMT
Long Day's Journey Into Night is often regarded as one of the saddest plays ever written. What else would you say comes close? Glass Menagerie, Streetcar, Death of a Salesman and Cat on a Hot Tin Roof are contenders I'd say. |
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4,581 posts
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Post by Mark on Feb 26, 2018 20:41:15 GMT
All My Sons
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1,465 posts
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Post by foxa on Feb 26, 2018 20:56:58 GMT
The Browning Version (Rattigan)
Glass Menagerie always gets me.
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Post by Deleted on Feb 26, 2018 22:02:48 GMT
The Beauty Queen of Leenane. Such a missed opportunity to be happy... Heartbreaking.
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2,389 posts
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Post by peggs on Feb 26, 2018 22:05:39 GMT
Moon for the misbegotten got me but apart from the browning version which I haven't seen I'd agree with the above.
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Post by crabtree on Feb 26, 2018 22:07:22 GMT
Shadowlands is up there for me - very hard to watch. I do always cry during Sunday in Sunday in the park with George, but those are very different tears, and very hard to explain tears....and yes I know it is a musical.
I have cried during Love's Labours Lost, surprisingly. A good topic here, that will provoke many good answers.
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Post by crabtree on Feb 26, 2018 22:09:48 GMT
And War Horse always gets the tear ducts going.
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Post by Deleted on Feb 26, 2018 22:20:12 GMT
Bent, After the Dance, and Going Dark.
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Post by Deleted on Feb 26, 2018 22:28:35 GMT
I saw Tango at the End of Winter in the 90s, and wept copiously. It was the music, and the slow falling cherry blossom while Alan Rickman danced a slow motion tango covered in blood.
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Post by Deleted on Feb 27, 2018 1:28:59 GMT
LOVE at the NT/Birmingham REP last year.
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Post by Jan on Feb 27, 2018 6:51:14 GMT
Uncle Vanya - the Robert Icke production particularly good. Year ago the NT did a version of Tolstoy's story "Strider the Story of a Horse" which was very affecting (many years before War Horse).
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1,465 posts
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Post by foxa on Feb 27, 2018 9:29:19 GMT
My daughter and I wept copiously at Daniel Kitson's 'It's Always Right Now Until It's Later.' We still get choked up when we quote lines from it.
For me, there is something about a character not wanting very much - and then not getting it - that breaks my heart.
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854 posts
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Post by bordeaux on Feb 27, 2018 10:08:03 GMT
For me it's Arcadia; the love story is beautifully done. And the Seagull too, especially when SRB played Konstantin.
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227 posts
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Post by barelyathletic on Feb 28, 2018 11:51:45 GMT
The Normal Heart.
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923 posts
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Post by Snciole on Feb 28, 2018 18:03:35 GMT
The Revlon Girl left me a wreck. I often see plays about people losing a loved one but there is something very fresh, very unfair about Aberfan.
I was fortunate to speak to the writer and he explained that one of the cast members had lost her son in an accident and it just staggered me more
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76 posts
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Post by bingomatic on Feb 28, 2018 18:08:10 GMT
Cuttin' It.
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Post by Deleted on Feb 28, 2018 18:17:32 GMT
I don’t know that play, Snciole, but I will look it up. Your mention of losing a loved one reminded me of another heartbreaking play- Mike Leigh’s Grief. The moments where the brother and sister- unable to talk about their loss-would sing quietly with each other was desperately moving. |
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Post by Deleted on Mar 1, 2018 0:47:49 GMT
Be My Baby by Amanda Whittington
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562 posts
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Post by jadnoop on Mar 1, 2018 1:22:06 GMT
The Father
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81 posts
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Post by jasper on Mar 1, 2018 13:41:14 GMT
Strindberg or Zeller? If Strindberg I would rather prefer To Damascus any part or all three. Last done at the Gate Theatre, but cannot recall when, possibly late 90s. Did all three as one so heavily cut. |
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Post by Deleted on Mar 1, 2018 14:24:42 GMT
The Revlon Girl left me a wreck. I often see plays about people losing a loved one but there is something very fresh, very unfair about Aberfan. I was fortunate to speak to the writer and he explained that one of the cast members had lost her son in an accident and it just staggered me more I've such a soft spot for this one despite never seeing it! I did a lot of work on their Arts Council applications and it just broke my heart just READING about the piece. So sad I never saw it. |
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529 posts
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Post by drowseychap on Mar 1, 2018 17:59:01 GMT
You may not believe it but butterfly lion the tour a couple of years ago 2 grown men me one of them in floods of tears at the end was wonderful production I preferred it to war horse
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81 posts
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Post by jasper on Mar 1, 2018 18:30:41 GMT
For me it has to be Nicholas Nickleby in David Edgar's version. I saw the original production in a first preview in a half empty theatre. I suppose the story telling of Dickens and his manipulation of emotions filtered through the theatricality of Nunn and Edgar make it a very moving experience. For me the highlights were when the uncle Ralph hands Mrs Nickleby down from the carriage and the narration is about missed opportunities between the pair. This is matched by the death of Spike, it brought a tear to this hardened theatergoer. Something that has not happened since.
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Post by Deleted on Mar 1, 2018 19:01:24 GMT
Bent was the first play that gave me an utterly visceral reaction. And that I couldn't shake for hours. The Normal Heart also (though I've never seen it).
Not quite a 'traditional' play but Mark Thomas' 'Bravo Figaro' where he tells the story of his father's relationship with Opera was utterly heartbreaking.
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Post by oxfordsimon on Mar 1, 2018 19:08:04 GMT
It wasn't my reaction but one which will stay with me for a long time. And whilst it might seem that I am taking credit for it - it actually rests with Techtonic Theater and my cast!
Too many years ago now, I directed the first production of The Laramie Project to be staged in Oxford. We took an early decision to drop US accents in favour of a range of regional British ones - to open out the themes of the piece (much as was done more recently with Our Town). I remember very clearly the final performance and seeing a young man sat with his head in his hands long after the rest of the audience had gone out. He was so shaken by the play that he couldn't move for crying.
I do not delude myself that it was my direction that created such a strong emotional response. I think the power of the piece lies in the way Techtonic told the story. But even though it was more than a decade ago, I can still see that young man (probably a student in his early 20s) sobbing because he had been swept up in the tragedy of Matt and his senseless murder. It reminds me that theatre can have an immense power.
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Post by crabtree on Mar 1, 2018 20:02:19 GMT
Yes the death of Smike in the RSC's NN was a shattering moment, beautifully played on an almost empty stage, with Roger R making you believe that the tall David Threlfall was indeed an emaciated waif. Pure heartbreaking magic from both of them.
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134 posts
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Post by romeo94 on Mar 1, 2018 22:03:57 GMT
Things I know to be true by Andrew Bovell recently at the Lyric Hammersmith left me in floods of tears. I think it was a combination of both writing and production too.
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1,909 posts
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Post by sf on Mar 1, 2018 23:05:41 GMT
Wings - both the play and the musical adaptation.
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515 posts
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Post by callum on Mar 1, 2018 23:22:35 GMT
Blanche’s fate at the end of Streetcar immediately comes to mind
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1,465 posts
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Post by foxa on Mar 2, 2018 19:13:13 GMT
Despite the unenthusiastic reviews, a lot of the audience was in tears at the end of 'Big Fish.'
'Death of a Salesman' always gets me - not just the ending, but the scene with the dictaphone, when he's trying to get a pay rise.
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