Déjàvu

by John Osborne

John Osborne's first full length stage play since 1976 is a transposition of "Look Back in Anger" in which Osborne explores contemporary British society a generation later. Osborne is also known for "The Entertainer", "Inadmissable Evidence" and adaptations of "Hedda Gabler" and "The Father".

104 pages, Paperback

First published June 1, 1991

About the author

People best know British playwright John James Osborne, member of the Angry Young Men, for his play Look Back in Anger (1956); vigorous social protest characterizes works of this group of English writers of the 1950s.

This screenwriter acted and criticized the Establishment. The stunning success of Look Back in Anger transformed English theatre. In a productive life of more than four decades, Osborne explored many themes and genres, writing for stage, film and television. His extravagant and iconoclastic personal life flourished. He notoriously used language of the ornate violence on behalf of the political causes that he supported and against his own family, including his wives and children, who nevertheless often gave as good as they got.

He came onto the theatrical scene at a time when British acting enjoyed a golden age, but most great plays came from the United States and France. The complexities of the postwar period blinded British plays. In the post-imperial age, Osborne of the writers first addressed purpose of Britain. He first questioned the point of the monarchy on a prominent public stage. During his peak from 1956 to 1966, he helped to make contempt an acceptable and then even cliched onstage emotion, argued for the cleansing wisdom of bad behavior and bad taste, and combined unsparing truthfulness with devastating wit.

Reviews

[David]

Curiously disappointing, not least in the second generation women with the same names as their first generation predecessors. I would have liked to have seen the original characters back as it is with the men. True, some examination of how the children react to the 'angry young men' now that they're angry, middle-aged nearly old men is interesting, especially in the character of the young Jimmy, who is a more active rebel than ever his father was, but who also only appears in dialogue, not as a character on stage. I was particularly disappointed to see old Jimmy, kissing new Helena, even if the relationship wasn't quite the same as old Jimmy and old Helena had been. In many ways a "Hey you kids, get off of my lawn!" kind of text. Helena has a great line that, for me, pretty much epitomizes the whole text: "I've never heard two men sit around talking such bone-crunching balls." at the same time she says this "(Lightly)" and Osborne has drawn specific attention to his stage directions in a brief prologue. Fair enough: it's a lot of balls, but some of it is relatively entertaining.

[Matt · Rating 1 out of 5]

Wikipedia states the following as the subject of this play:

“A middle-aged man rants about modern life.”

If that doesn't sound interesting to you, the text will not change your mind.