The Illusion [Paperback]

Tony Kushner (Author), Pierre Corneille (Author)

Editorial Reviews

From Booklist

Best known for the ambitious, intellectually engaging though somewhat bloated Angels in America, Tony Kushner is capable of writing in lighter keys. Witness this witty adaptation of Corneille's seventeenth-century comedy, L'illusion Comique. Not content to merely translate the play, Kushner rehabs it, paring it down to two acts while adding several scenes of his own. The resulting Corneille-Kushner hybrid is a wonderful, postmodern work, at once a homage to and a send-up of the conventions and devices of neoclassical comedy: the long speeches, the play within a play, the formulaic plot. On one level, the play works as a two-act meditation on the power of theater and the importance of illusion and storytelling; on another, it is the genuinely moving story of an old man's search for his long-lost son. "The art of illusion," one of Kushner's characters quips, "is the art of love, and the art of love is the blood-red heart of the world." It is this heart that saves Kushner's Illusion from being merely an academic exercise. Jack Helbig --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Review

In a eminently playable, witty adaptation by Tony Kushner, THE ILLUSION comes across as downright entertaining, not an adjective anyone who reads Corneille in college is likely to expect. Unlike his better known plays, which have heroic subjects, THE ILLUSION is concerned with domestic matters the alienation of parents from children, marital infidelity. While it is serious about these subjects, it puts them in an unusual context: A father has consulted a magician about his estranged son, and the magician shows him scenes from his son's life... The comedy is elegant, full of depth. --Howard Kissel, Daily News

What are the real powers of sorcery? To alter? To define? To transport? Tony Kushner and Pierre Corneille before him go for all three, which is only part of the magic in Kushner's fanciful adaptation of Corneille's L'ILLUSION COMIQUE. Freely adapted it is, in the best sense. For Corneille, whose later, loftier verse plays earned him the stodgy title of Father of French Tragedy, THE ILLUSION was a mildly satirical precursor to all that a glitch, written when he was only twenty-nine. Yet even then, it was burdened by a ponderous Seventeenth-Century neo-classical style that kept the word comique out of Twentieth-Century range. Kushner's achievement is digging under all the circumlocution to salvage an ageless and universal tale, stripping the nugget of its ornamentation and serving it up to us lingually lucid and lean. There is some colloquial indulgence in the rewritten language, but it's mostly judicious. We're in on the joke, which never goes too far. Simply put, this the tale of a rigid father, Pridament, who, stricken with remorse for having provoked his son to flee the family home, searches out the magician Aleandre in the hope that he will help him find out what happened to the wayward boy. Aleandre does, and the ironic twist of the piece is that after several false starts, passionate re-enactments, comic delusions and confusions, the truth is revealed and Papa finds he doesn't like it. The light-hearted ending is a cynical but honest lesson in selective affection. All the fun, however, is in getting there. THE ILLUSION takes us into territory on which theater thrives: fantasy, witchcraft, transcended place and time --Sylvie Drake, Los Angeles Times

What a fascinating, totally theatrical excursion we're in for in this 17th Century fairytale-fable first spun by French classical dramatist Pierre Corneille. In 1639, L'ILLUSION COMIQUE was a comedy they didn't know what to make of; Twentieth Century playwright Tony Kushner knows what to make of it. Triumphantly exhumed and enlivened three and a half centuries later in Kushner's fresh, free adaptation; it proves indeed to be...`a prematurely modern play'. Both modern and ancient, timeless and timely, flippant and profound... It is a thorough delight.... L'ILLUSION COMIQUE was a masterpiece waiting for its time to happen. Tony Kushner made it happen and made it better. It is essence of theater, essence of archetypal magic. Carl Jung would have loved it. --Polly Warfield, Drama-Logue

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Product Details

• Paperback: 72 pages
• Publisher: Broadway Play Publishing, Inc. (December 31, 2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0881452319
• ISBN-13: 978-0881452310
• Product Dimensions: 8.3 x 5.7 x 0.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 4 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (7 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #336,683 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Tony Kushner's plays include A Bright Room Called Day and Slavs!; as well as adaptations of Corneille's The Illusion, Ansky's The Dybbuk, Brecht's The Good Person of Szecguan and Goethe's Stella. Current projects include: Henry Box Brown or The Mirror of Slavery; and two musical plays: St. Cecilia or The Power of Music and Caroline or Change. His collaboration with Maurice Sendak on an American version of the children's opera, Brundibar, appeared in book form Fall 2003. Kushner grew up in Lake Charles, Louisiana, and he lives in New York.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The Adaptation is Phenomenal, January 21, 2007

A Kid's Review

This review is from: The Illusion (TCG Translations) (Paperback)

This spring, we will be performing Tony Kushner's adaptation of "The Illusion" at my high school. I could not have asked for a better play. Besides the fact that I'll be playing Pridament (a wonderful boost to my ego), the play itself is genius. I was under its spell starting on page one, and didn't stop enjoying it until the twist ending and startling conclusion. It is the prime example of a perfect play: stylized, with your typical hero-heroine-rival-clown setup. Comic dialogue, a tragic, heartbreaking theme, and most of the sensual delights of a traditional sex farce.

The story outline is simple: a desperate, depressed, dying lawyer (Pridament of Avignon) visits the cave of the magician Alcandre. His dying wish is to find his only son, whom he had banished fifteen years before. With the help of Alcandre and his servant, the tortured deaf-mute Amanuensis, Pridament sees several visions of his son's life over the past years. He witnesses three different visions, all of which involve his son, a lover and her scheming maid, and a vengeful rival. Most of the action of the play takes place within these visions, with Alcandre and Pridament simply watching from the outside. But when this play really shines is within the short scenes between the father, magician, and servant. The characterizations of all three, especially of the Amanuensis (a mostly silent role), are key to the theme of the play.

The diction of this play is phenomenal. Written completely in free poetic verse, it has the most extensive vocabulary of any play I have read. Full of alliteration, allusion, rhyme and bizarre sentance structure, The Illusion truly lives up to its name.

"He doesn't speak because he has no tongue..."

"If not in this life, than in the next."

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Wonderful!, December 8, 2005

By 

Ophelia "Stratford" (Stratford-Upon-Avon) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Illusion (TCG Translations) (Paperback)

I loved this play! I first saw it in college, and it was very moving, funny, and interesting. It doesn't hurt that we had a fantastic cast. I love the spooky elements of Alcandre and Pridamant's meeting- I love the translation of this play, by the genius Tony Kushner. There's a timeless element of the Illusion of life in the theatre, as well as death and surprise and twist endings.

5.0 out of 5 stars The Illusion, April 29, 2011

By 

Isabelle Jolly (El Segundo, CA) - See all my reviews
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Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: The Illusion (Paperback)

I bought this play because my granddaughter is in it. It's an unusual, surreal, story of a man who goes to a wizard to find out what has happened to his son after he kicked him out years earlier. He now regrets it. The wizard brings up views progressing through his son's life. The father, however, can not talk to him or touch him.

If you like unusual plays, you will really enjoy this. It's almost a morality story. If you find fantasy distasteful and prefer realistic stories, the play probably isn't your cup of tea!