La Bete and Wrong Mountain: Two Plays by David Hirson [Paperback]

David Hirson (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: May 10, 2001

David Hirson's La Bete and Wrong Mountain are widely regarded as two of the most controversial and original American plays produced on Broadway in the past decade. Critics have compared Hirson, who is known as a rebel, to Joe Orton, Tom Stoppard, John Osborne, Charles Ludlam, Maxwell Anderson, and even Prokofiev. Written in rhyming iambic-pentameter couplets, La Bete recounts the arrival of a vulgar street performer, Valere, into an elite company of veteran actors. The battles between Elomire, the troupe's leader, and Valere provides the basis for an antic comedy questioning the divide between art and entertainment. Popular acclaim eludes Wrong Mountain's protagonist, Henry Dennett, an aging poet, until he makes a bet with a successful playwright, Guy Halperin, that he can write a play and have it produced. Dennett triumphs, but he is left wondering whether he has spent his entire life climbing the "wrong mountain." "David Hirson is a gutsy, loopy, genuinely original writer who revels in extremes of intellectual virtuosity and pop-culture savvy." -- Linda Winer, Newsday

Product Details

• Paperback: 144 pages
• Publisher: Grove Press; 1st edition (May 10, 2001)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0802138217
• ISBN-13: 978-0802138217
• Product Dimensions: 8.3 x 5.6 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 14.4 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (6 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #849,236 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

34 of 35 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Spellbinding, Revolutionary Pieces of Theater, June 21, 2002

By A Customer

This review is from: La Bete and Wrong Mountain: Two Plays by David Hirson (Paperback)

It is well nigh impossible to think of a playwright in the past twenty years who has sent greater shockwaves through the American theater than David Hirson. La Bete and Wrong Mountain were unlike anything Broadway had ever seen. And, for one brief shining moment, each made Broadway seem important again.

Part of what made these plays so exciting in the theater was the way in which they polarized audiences. I know people who were variously outraged, scandalized or confounded by them. ...
For my money, La Bete and Wrong Mountain were not only wonderfully entertaining, thought-provoking plays. They were the kind of audacious, category-defying miracles of theater that come along once, maybe twice, in a generation. And they were made doubly miraculous by their appearance on Broadway, a showbiz mecca that long ago ceased to be cutting-edge! (That they managed to survive even briefly in such an unhospitable environment is a miracle in itself!)

Normally, reading plays is not the greatest of pleasures. Having just finished this book, I can say unreservedly that La Bete and Wrong Mountain read like fantastic novels! They are both, after all, plays of language, and it is thrilling to luxuriate in Mr. Hirson's wordplay at one's own pace. There is also a remarkable preface by the author.

With this book, many people will have the opportunity to discover two gloriously unique works which are well on their way to assuming landmark status in the American theater. I envy them that discovery!

35 of 37 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Two Masterworks As Thrilling To Read As They Were To See!, April 2, 2002

By A Customer

This review is from: La Bete and Wrong Mountain: Two Plays by David Hirson (Paperback)

Anyone who was privileged enough - as I was - to see the original productions of David Hirson's (now legendary) La Bete and Wrong Mountain will doubtlessly discover that these two one-of-a-kind pieces, united at last in this handsome edition by Grove/ Atlantic, are as exultantly odd and subversive on the page as they were on the Broadway stage. Uproarious, intellectually challenging, and ablaze with white-knuckle passion, these plays remind one, upon reading them, why they provoked such hysterical divisiveness among the New York theatre establishment, leading more than one commentator to compare Hirson's volatile experience to that of the early Beckett, Orton and Pinter.
The comparison is not untoward. In their radical sensibilty, these two fiercely original works clearly occupy a category unto themselves, and are the rare examples of dramatic literature that not only contribute to theatrical form but subtly - and entertainingly! - redefine it. They also happen to be two of the funniest plays ever written.
For their dangerous unconventionality, linguistic inventiveness, existential curiosity, and utterly unique sense of humor, the plays in this volume stand head-and-shoulders above anything else out there. What a joy that they are in print at last!

30 of 32 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The Controversy Continues!, June 14, 2002

By A Customer

This review is from: La Bete and Wrong Mountain: Two Plays by David Hirson (Paperback)

When I read the two wildly divided opinions to Mr. Hirson's plays on this site, I was reminded of the critical response to Wrong Mountain. Some hailed it as magnificent, others dismissed it as dross. Which is exactly the kind of reaction that trailblazing works of art have always elicited: extremes of delight and revulsion.
I thought Wrong Mountain was a very great play. (I did not see La Bete.) That it managed only a short run on tourist-trap Broadway says more about Broadway, ultimately, than about the play. (Waiting for Godot, after all, was a failure on the Great White Way; Cats was a huge success!)
I am looking forward to reading La Bete to see if it maintains the same dizzyingly high standard as Wrong Mountain. Whether it does or not, Wrong Mountain is, in my opinion, an indispensable work of dramatic literature. And, like all major works, it is bound to remain extremely controversial. For Wrong Mountain alone, I give this book the highest rating.