JOHN OSBORNE
LOOK BACK IN ANGER (a play in three acts)
The first performance of Look Back in Anger took place in the Royal Court Theatre, on 8th May/1956.
CAST:
Jimmy Porter: A young man with university studies, who doesn’t accept the world where he lives.
Cliff Lewis: Jimmy’s friend, who helps him in a sweet stall and lives with him on the flat.
Allison Porter: Jimmy’s wife, a Colonel’s daughter, lives in the flat with her husband and his friend.
Helena Charles: Allison’s friend, who appears in the play to make Allison braking up with Jimmy and who will have sex with Jimmy.
Colonel Redfern: Allison’s father, a retired colonel of the British Army in the India, has a reactionary behaviour, which will make him and Jimmy argue and have a bad relationship.
SPACE:
The play takes place in a small flat in the Midlands, which has only one bedroom and is shared by three people. On the stage we only see the flat, the living room, but there are references to other places, like the train station or the place they work, the sweet stall.
TIME:
The time is the present time of the moment it was represented.
In the ACT I, the time is a Sunday evening, April, in the ACT II there are two scenes, the scene I runs two weeks later and the scene II in the following evening.
The ACT III is divided in two scenes too; the scene I run several months later and the scene II only few minutes later.
SUMMARY:
Jimmy doesn’t accept the world where he lives, the job he has, the flat he lives, his wife’s family and also his wife. He is a university-educated man who has to work in a sweet stall of a theatre for a small pay.
All these factors explode in a lot of rage attacks when Jimmy argues with his wife, often the discussion starts talking about Allison’s family. Cliff is an spectator in the most of argues.
The play changes when Jimmy has to go out to visit a friend’s mother, at the same time, Helena appears to take away Allison, because she knows Allison is suffering.
Helena calls Colonel Redfern and he takes his daughter away.
When Jimmy returns, he starts a relationship with Helena, this fact is so surprising because he hates Helena, and her made Allison going away because she was having a bad life
Allison, who had lost a baby, Jimmy’s baby, returns to visit them, and there will be arguments between them, which will finish with Helena going away and Allison returning to her old life, with Jimmy and the anger, maybe because she really loves Jimmy although his behaviour and hate against her family .
In this end, Osborne might say us that love is an irrational feeling; there is no sense in love.