Independent on Sunday, May 6, 1990, by Irving Wardle
-----------------------------------------------------------

Friedrich Hebbel, pioneer of nineteenth-century bourgeois 
tragedy and a figure revered by Ibsen (who wondered why the 
Germans paid any attention to him when they had such a 
master of their own), takes a modest bow over here in the 
Gate production of his best known piece, "Maria Magdalena." 
The story of Klara, whose rival suitors die in a duel and 
who then jumps in a well to spare her father the shame of 
her pregnancy, lives up to the German death-wish stereotype. 
What it has to say about German middle-class family life 
(whose rules for where you hang your hat are as important as 
the Ten Commandments) is obscured by Sarah Somekh's decision 
to set her translation in the American Deep South. There 
are, however, some punchy performances (from Robert Bowman 
and David Beeler): and those of us still trying to get an 
international theatre education are once again in debt to 
this gallant little house.



-----------------------------------------------------------
                     Bentley's Bedlam
            http://www.BetsyDa.com/bedlam.html

This website is for information and entertainment purposes only 
and is not intended to infringe on copyrights held by others.