The Goat or Who is Sylvia?
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- For other uses of the term, see goat (disambiguation).
The Goat or, Who is Sylvia? written by Edward Albee, premiered on Broadway in 2002. Although it opened to mixed reviews, it won that year's Tony Award for Best Play. In 2004, it opened in London and was a considerable success.
Considered by many to be the greatest living American playwright, Albee’s play drew film stars Bill Pullman and Academy Award-winner Mercedes Ruehl to Broadway. Ruehl was later replaced by two-time Academy Award-winner Sally Field, and Pullman was replaced by Bill Irwin who later won a Tony Award for Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf.
About a married, middle-aged architect whose life crumbles when he falls in love with a goat, the play focuses on where the limits of an ostensibly liberal society are. Through showing this family in crisis, Albee challenges audience members to question their own morality in the face of social taboos including infidelity, homosexuality, and incest.
The play also features many language games and grammatical arguments in the middle of catastrophes and existential disputes between the characters.
The name is a reference to the song "Who is Silvia" from Shakespeare's play The Two Gentlemen of Verona which Proteus sings hoping to woo Silvia. Franz Schubert's setting of the song contributed to its popularity outside Shakespeare's play.
[edit] Text edition
- Edward Albee, The Goat, or, Who is Sylvia? (Notes toward a definition of tragedy), London: Methuen, 2004, ISBN 0-413-77385-X [1].
| Plays by Edward Albee | |
|---|---|
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The Zoo Story | The Death of Bessie Smith | The Sandbox | Fam and Yam | The American Dream | Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? | The Ballad of the Sad Cafe | Tiny Alice | Malcolm | A Delicate Balance | Everything in the Garden | Box | Sandbox | All Over | Seascape | Listening | Counting the Ways | The Lady From Dubuque | Lolita | The Man Who Had Three Arms | Finding the Sun | Marriage Play | Three Tall Women | The Lorca Play | Fragments | The Play About the Baby | The Goat, or, Who is Sylvia? | Occupant | Peter & Jerry |
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