News

Hudson Theatre’s Adaptation of “1984” Brings Real Terror to the Stage

Published

7 years ago

June 25, 2017

It isn’t often in today’s Broadway landscape that audiences are known to faint or vomit mid-show, nor do we often hear stories of theatergoers being arrested for breaking into fights during or after a performance. Gone are the days when audiences would yell at actors because they were so consumed by the performance that they feared for a performer’s life. And yet, at the Hudson Theatre in New York, audiences have been witnessing these very events since previews began of a new adaptation of George Orwell’s 1984.

The production, starring Olivia Wilde, Reed Birney, and Tom Sturridge, has been shocking audiences since it opened in London, but American audiences have seemed especially prone to intense reactions to its graphic portrayals of torture as well as the play’s message of resistance to government misinformation. It’s a hot button topic in the United States at the moment and the source novel has seen a resurgence in popularity since Inauguration Day 2017.

With the current administration’s use of phrases like “alternative facts” and constant cries of “fake news”, it seems the perfect time for such an adaptation. The story centers around Winston Smith (Sturridge) who silently deals with the oppression in fictional Oceania where every move is examined under the watchful eye of their leader, Big Brother. Winston works in the Records department of the Ministry of Truth where his job involves distorting history to fit the government’s message. In the course of time, Winston meets a woman named Julia (Wilde) with whom he falls in love. Smith begins keeping a diary, an offense punishable by death, and his non-conformity becomes his ultimate downfall.

Photo Credit: Julieta Cervantes

While most audiences might know the the novel, it’s one thing to read a scene and quite another to have it performed only a few feet from them. Aside from the vomiting and fainting, the actors have reported audience members yelling at them including one who shouted at Birney to stop during a particularly violent scene. Birney, still in character, shouted back. In other instances, they have shouted their approval or disdain of scenes in the play and some have even been known to call out for actors to “Resist!”

By opening night, directors Duncan Macmillan and Robert Icke had imposed an age restriction on the production. No one under age 13 is allowed to attend the show. The directors also encourages audience members who cannot handle the gratuitous torture scenes to exit the theater.

“You can stay and watch or you can leave — that’s a perfectly fine reaction to watching someone be tortured,” Icke told The Hollywood Reporter. “But if this show is the most upsetting part of anyone’s day, they’re not reading the news headlines. Things are much worse than a piece of theater getting under your skin a little bit.”

Icke has a point. The place of art has always been to stir its audience, to draw upon their emotions and make them question their reality. 1984 is a perfect example for this time and place and its terror is real because it so closely mirrors some of our current situation. Regardless, it is certainly a production for the books.

For more information about the production, including videos, pictures and more, check out their official website!

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Movies

‘Evil Dead’ Film Franchise Getting TWO New Installments

Published

5 hours ago

April 26, 2024

Timothy Rawles

It was a risk for Fede Alvarez to reboot Sam Raimi’s horror classic The Evil Dead in 2013, but that risk paid off and so did its spiritual sequel Evil Dead Rise in 2023. Now Deadline is reporting that the series is getting, not one, but two fresh entries.

We already knew about the Sébastien Vaniček upcoming film that delves into the Deadite universe and should be a proper sequel to the latest film, but we are broadsided that Francis Galluppi and Ghost House Pictures are doing a one-off project set in Raimi’s universe based off of an idea that Galluppi pitched to Raimi himself. That concept is being kept under wraps.

“Francis Galluppi is a storyteller who knows when to keep us waiting in simmering tension and when to hit us with explosive violence,” Raimi told Deadline. “He is a director that shows uncommon control in his feature debut.”

That feature is titled The Last Stop In Yuma County which will release theatrically in the United States on May 4. It follows a traveling salesman, “stranded at a rural Arizona rest stop,” and “is thrust into a dire hostage situation by the arrival of two bank robbers with no qualms about using cruelty-or cold, hard steel-to protect their bloodstained fortune.”

Galluppi is an award-winning sci-fi/horror shorts director whose acclaimed works include High Desert Hell and The Gemini Project. You can view the full edit of High Desert Hell and the teaser for Gemini below:

^{High Desert Hell}

^{The Gemini Project}

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Movies

‘Invisible Man 2’ Is “Closer Than Its Ever Been” to Happening

Published

7 hours ago

April 26, 2024

Timothy Rawles

Elisabeth Moss in a very well-thought-out statement said in an interview for Happy Sad Confused that even though there have been some logistical issues for doing Invisible Man 2 there is hope on the horizon.

Podcast host Josh Horowitz asked about the follow-up and if Moss and director Leigh Whannell were any closer to cracking a solution to getting it made. “We are closer than we have ever been to cracking it,” said Moss with a huge grin. You can see her reaction at the 35:52 mark in the below video.

^{Happy Sad Confused}

Whannell is currently in New Zealand filming another monster movie for Universal, Wolf Man, which might be the spark that ignites Universal’s troubled Dark Universe concept which hasn’t gained any momentum since Tom Cruise’s failed attempt at resurrecting The Mummy.

Also, in the podcast video, Moss says she is not in the Wolf Man film so any speculation that it’s a crossover project is left in the air.

Meanwhile, Universal Studios is in the middle of constructing a year-round haunt house in Las Vegas which will showcase some of their classic cinematic monsters. Depending on attendance, this could be the boost the studio needs to get audiences interested in their creature IPs once more and to get more films made based on them.

The Las Vegas project is set to open in 2025, coinciding with their new proper theme park in Orlando called Epic Universe.

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News

Jake Gyllenhaal’s Thriller ‘Presumed Innocent’ Series Gets Early Release Date

Published

10 hours ago

April 26, 2024

Timothy Rawles

Jake Gyllenhaal’s limited series Presumed Innocent is dropping on AppleTV+ on June 12 instead of June 14 as originally planned. The star, whose Road House reboot has brought mixed reviews on Amazon Prime, is embracing the small screen for the first time since his appearance on Homicide: Life on the Street in 1994.

Jake Gyllenhaal’s in ‘Presumed Innocent’

Presumed Innocent is being produced by David E. Kelley, J.J. Abrams’ Bad Robot, and Warner Bros. It is an adaptation of Scott Turow’s 1990 film in which Harrison Ford plays a lawyer doing double duty as an investigator looking for the murderer of his colleague.

These types of sexy thrillers were popular in the ’90s and usually contained twist endings. Here’s the trailer for the original:

According to Deadline, Presumed Innocent doesn’t stray far from the source material: “…the Presumed Innocent series will explore obsession, sex, politics and the power and limits of love as the accused fights to hold his family and marriage together.”

Up next for Gyllenhaal is the Guy Ritchie action movie titled In the Grey scheduled for release in January 2025.

Presumed Innocent is an eight-episode limited series set to stream on AppleTV+ starting June 12.