Customer Reviews

Sabrina Fair

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Samuel Taylor (1912-2000) is perhaps best recalled by "serious" critics as the author of Alfred Hitchcock's VERTIGO--but he is probably best recalled by the public at large for the 1953 play SABRINA FAIR and its two film incarnations, the 1954 film SABRINA starring Audrey Hepburn and the 1995 film starring Julia Ormond. All three were major successes, and the play itself has remained a popular theatre ticket around the world for more than fifty years.

Readers who come to the play from either film version will be surprized: although the three leading characters are essentially the same, the story and supporting characters are significantly different. The Larabee family is both a Wall Street power and social significant. Retired father Linus Larabee, who now spends his time attending funerals, has handed over the reigns of power to his sons; his wife Maude, however, continues reign over the social set in no uncertain terms. Their two sons, Linus Jr. and David, are both single: Linus is cold and sharp and something of a brutal lady-killer; David is more of a social figure, and although divorced has a romantic turn of mind. And both of them run afoul of Sabrina, daughter of the family chauffeur, newly returned from Paris after five years.

The story plays out to the same conclusion found in the film versions but in a very different way, with Sabrina forced to select between three romantic possibilities--and ultimately selecting the least likely for reasons that differ significantly from the film versions. Nonetheless, the story has tremendous charm, an unexpected sharpness, and makes an unexpectedly but distinctly comic comment on wealth and social caste. Strongly recommended.

GFT

good theater can happen and be original!

A play that spurred a film adaptation by Billy Wilder that was later remade into a film staring Harrison Ford and Julia Ormond, this is an elegant slice of 50s theater. A simple cast with one simple set. Some bit parts. Some great laughs and a lot of what I think American theater has lost over the course of the past 20 years... HEART.

It's a play that is about art instead of artiface, as the title taken from John Donne suggests. If your an actor, director, playwright, or producer, give this text a read to learn what a brilliant peice of writing for the stage should be.