Whos Afraid Of Virginia Woolf Essay

There are some plays that are a challenge to translate into film. Some plays have so much dialogue a straight adaptation would not be very cinematic. Other times there are plays with content that may be challenging to translate to film. At the time of its production in 1966, Ernest Lehman’s adaptation of Who’s Afraid of the Virginia Woolf faced both the challenges of translating the talky stage play to screen and also having to battle again the strict content regulations placed on Hollywood at the time. Director Mike Nichols make his cinematic directorial debut with this film, with his stage work leading TIME magazine declaring him “the most in-demand director in the American theatre” at the time. The film utilizes the camera as the eye for the audience. In the film two college students, Nick and Honey, take on the role as audience surrogates, invited into the home of a seemingly ordinary married couple, Martha and George. It is through the couple’s actions displayed on screen that the audience sees the truth that exists behind the fourth wall. During scenes of intense conflict, the camera gets up close to the actors’ faces. A sense of
While it does lose the sense of claustrophobia with these four characters trapped in a one room set, it does allow for a change of scenery. To this effect, it allow moments to breath, such as George moving the action outdoors for a scene following a dramatic conflict. No such change in scenery is noted in the play script. Time seems to go on forever, since the cutting of the film is allowed to suggest time has passed. “…Mr. Albee’s writing itself provides all you really need for the play’s visceral intensity to hit home: highly literate, stippled with corrosive wit and bristling with combativeness, it doesn’t really require much in the way of staging to work its wounding