Aristocrats
3.4 (10) · Contemporary
by Brian Friel
Overview
Ballybeg Hall once played host to grand balls, musical evenings, tennis parties: its rooms busy, bursting with painters, poets and politicians. And presiding over all of it, the imposing figure of Judge O’Donnell.
Now, on the eve of a wedding, the O’Donnell children return to their ancestral home to find that the rot has set in.
Lyndsey Turner returns to the Donmar following Faith Healer and Philadelphia, Here I Come! to direct Brian Friel’s haunting play about a generation whose past threatens to obliterate its future.
Critic reviews
Brian Friel's stock has certainly been soaring this summer. First, the superlative Translations at the National; now this
I was particularly taken with David Dawson as Casimir, the wayward, rather fey only boy of the family, who admirably controlled the wilder eccentricities of the character
Compelling and powerful story of life in decay
Lyndsey Turner directs a beautiful revival of Brian Friel’s drama
A once-grand Irish family faces an uncertain future in Brian Friel’s absorbing play
This portrait of a dysfunctional Irish family is elegant, eloquent and moving
Sleepy production of Brian Friel’s 1979 play never quite manages to move beyond being a fascinating lesson in Irish history
This overly abstract production is lifted by first-rate performances in an engrossing tale of decaying culture and rocky relationships
Despite the freshness of her approach, a kind of pensive minimalism, Turner’s cast never really master the delicate music of Friel’s text
David Dawson is particularly impressive as Casimir, all restless hands and anxious eyes and Eileen Walsh finds a resonant calmness as Judith
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