When he first started writing plays, Osborne sought help from those more knowledgeable on the subject than himself and ended up collaborating with two different authors on a total of three separate works. His first two plays produced were The Devil Inside Him, produced in 1950 co-written with Stella Linden, and Personal Enemy, produced in 1955 co-written with Anthony Creighton. The latter is arguably the more interesting or important of the two because later Osborne would collaborate on a third work: Epitaph for George Dillon, co-written again with Anthony Creighton.
He was also clearly interested in the works of the famous authors that came before him as he adapted the works of several influential playwrights for both the stage and screen. In 1966 he started by adapting one of Lope de Vega's works La fianza satisfecha into his own creation titled A Bond Honored. He then went on to adapt Ibsen's Hedda Gabler (1972), Wilde's The Picture of Dorian Gray (1975) and Strindberg's The Father (1989). He also adapted Shakespeare's Coriolanus into his own work titled A Place Calling Itself Rome in 1973, but it was never produced.
This seems to show that Osborne focused more on adaptations than original works. I am very struck by the adaptations he chose to do as well. They vary greatly from doing an adaptation of Lope de Vega to Ibsen. Osborne must have had a very creative mind to be able to have such a successful career, largely based on adaptations.
ReplyDeleteI think it was smart, albeit safe, of him to start out his career collaborating with others. It would allow him to learn from his peers, so he could hopefully skip any major period of failure. I also found it interesting how much he focused on adaptations. If I ever have the time, I think it would be interesting to see how similar/different his adaptations are to the originals.
ReplyDeleteIn Osborne's adaptation of "Hedda Gabler" he states that he did not want his work to be a one-character play, rather, he wanted to give complexity to many other characters in the play. I also read that he eliminated some important time and class bound references in his adaptation? Do you think this hindered the overall work? Was his audience pleased with his adaptation or find it rather unnecessary?
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