Drama on 3: O'Neill's, Long Day's Journey Into Night,

[Stanley Stewart]

O'Neill's masterwork, Long Day's Journey Into Night (LDJIN) is scheduled for broadcast on R3, Sunday, 25 June, 21.00-00.00hrs. The NT production, 1972ish, directed by Michael Blakemore, attracted a star cast, headed by Laurence Olivier, opened, unusually, at the New Theatre, (now the Noel Coward Th), to sell-out houses, before transferring to the NT repertoire at The Old Vic for a long run. Olivier triumphed in the role of James Tyrone at a time when his health problems took root when he was also required to play a demanding role in a near four - hour production, with matinee performances on Wed & Saturday. Sensibly, the two-a-day shows were abandoned when the production trnsferred to the Old Vic. Constance Cummings, a fine American actress resident in the UK, played the role of his morphine-addicted wife. Mary, and an exceptional cast was completed by Denis Quilley, as the 33-year-old alcoholic son, Jamie, with Ronald Pickup as the tubercular Edmond, 23; O'Neill called them 'the four haunted Tyrones' as every tortured conversation unfolds in the living-room of the family's summer home in Connecticut, August 1912.I recall from visits to several O'Neill plays that the scene setting can be a bit of a drag but...once the spell of accumulative power is established, the experience is spellbinding and time becomes secondary. I saw the NT production several times during its long run and noted the changes when Olivier wisely limited his athletic leaps as the ageing leading actor. In particular, his continued insistence on physical risk involved a very dangerous teeter on the edge of a dining room table, on to which the pathologically thrifty Tyrone climbs to unscrew a light bulb from a chandelier. The tension on-stage and in the auditorium was nail-biting. Olivier also had to overcome a tendency to memory lapses but Quilley remembers watching Olivier rehearse like 'a terrier hunting a rat. Literally spent hours nagging away at tiny pieces of business - lighting a cigar, opening his pocket watch...-until they were second nature to the character and completely integrated into the whole'. Oliver beat O'Neill's script into submission, then cherished it, hearing echoes of his own career: "There are some things which, as James Tyrone found, one never forgets. Whe I first became an actor...I was hungry, out of work and terrified".

The BBC cast includes Robert Glenister as Tyrone, Anastasia Hille, Mary Tyrone, Rupert Evans, Jamie Tyrone and Gwilym Lee, Edmund Tyrone.

I also have an off-air DVD in my collection of Sydney Lumet's 1962 film version of LDJIN with Ralph Richardson as Tyrone, Katharine Hepburn, Mary, with Jason Hobards jnr, Dean Stockwell as the two sons. Score by Andre Previn. A fine atmospheric production in monochrome with Richardson opting for Tyrone's eccentricity compared to Olivier's earthy interpretation. Hepburn quite superb.

[DracoM]

Judging by the scheduling [ 9 p.m.-Midnight] this looks to be pretty nearly the whole text?

[Stanley Stewart]

Agreed, Draco, this is likely to be wide reading gathering strength in its accumulative power!

[DracoM]

A revelation of brilliant actor skills, the intensity and claustrophobia that radio can do so well, but above all the relentless, deeply penetrating evisceration of a family's pretensions and delusions it has created for itself. One of the best nights of drama on R3 I have heard in years.

Don't want to pick out any one actor; the level of insight and skill EACH brought to their own role and the often bewilderingly volatile reaction between them as a team sustained the three hours.

At midnight, you just had to sit back and gasp as the piano died away.

[french frank]

At midnight, you just had to sit back and gasp as the piano died away.

Already scheduled for later listening as I don't do midnight … Thanks for the review.

[Stanley Stewart]

A slow-burning but enthralling experience which enticed me to burn the midnight oil - my 'time of day' after several years in rep in the 60s and 70s when the "ignominy of learning lines" (Olivier) required me to stay awake and study far beyond the witching hour.

The surprise of last night's broadcast was the sheer pleasure of listening to the craft of radio production at the top of its game. It's been a slow development from the age of the BBC Rep players putting on voices to match their character and managing to adapt to a more low-key and subtle approach in performance which brought out the colour, range and intensity of the narrative. I'm glad I recorded it on HD and, fearing overnight gremlins, did an instant transfer from HD recording to a separate CD-R for back-up. Listening to the end credits, I have a feeling that this production was contracted out. I also retired with a copy of Denis Quilley's 2004 biography, Happiness Indeed, An Actor's Life, to revisit memories of the NT rehearsals with Olivier; the charm and ruthless steeliness of a great actor in his mature years before the stress of his final illnesses .
"...To play, as I did, Macbeth, Lopakhin in The Cherry Orchard and Hildy Johnson in The Front Page all in one season, in the company of people like Diana Rigg, Michael Hordern and Constance Cummings, is surely the theatre actor's dream scenario. It was twelve hours a day, six days a week for much of the time, and we were often tired - but never bored..."

Fortunately, I've also managed to acquire a copy of the NT 1972 production of LDJIN - the last copy - from the river people at under £7 and it is now en route for delivery. A splendid companion to Sidney Lumet's 1960 production with the sharp contrast between the sea landscape and the indoors claustrophobia.

[Stanley Stewart]

My print of the NT production has now arrived and astonished me by the mint freshness of the production. I assume that it was filmed after the production had completed a run in the West End, followed by a transfer to the Old Vic in 1973, a much needed money spinner at a time of draconian cuts in the arts. The TV tranmission followed on 22 April 1973, Michael Blakemore's production superbly adapted by Peter Wood, and how cleverly the cast modified their performances to the pitch and intensity required for the scale of television. Perhaps Olivier was 'a bit busy' at times, he really was the actor's actor, and he even radiated a powerful presence when listening - an art in itself - to the internecine family warfare. The production enhanced, too, by the exquisite designs of Michael Annals in muted colour.

I understood that I had acquired the last print by the river people but note that further copies have now been acquired. Made a quick decision for additional copies and a script of the play which quickly headed my early listing for Christmas gifts! The DVD now included in my top ten favourites.

[DracoM]

Thx for update and info.

Think I may have seen Olivier in this in my distant youth. Will hack back through some programmes.