Dorfman Names Amores Star for Purgatory??? Date: 20 January 2003
Chilean playwright Ariel Dorfman has revealed more details about Purgatory (or Purgatorio), his follow-up to the award-winning Death and the Maiden (See The Goss, 19 Mar 2002). Death and the Maiden premiered in 1991 at the Royal Court before transferring to the West End's Duke of York's and scooping Oliviers for Best New Play and Best Actress for Juliet Stevenson. That play - set in the aftermath of a vicious South American dictatorship in which the protagonist Paulina was tortured and raped by a government official who has now turned up as her husband's house guest - drew on Dorfman's own experiences in Pinochet-ruled Chile. Death and the Maiden was subsequently made into a film, directed by Roman Polanski and starring Sigourney Weaver and Ben Kingsley. Speaking in the Independent, Dorfman said the characters in Purgatory were not the same as in Death and the Maiden, although he does consider the new play a "thematic sequel". It asks: "How do I forgive the person who has most hurt me in the world? ... In Purgatorio, one man and one woman tied by love and hatred like so many couples in time ... are forced to try to find that answer." Rupert Graves was originally touted to star in the piece, which was originally slated for a spring 2002 opening, but Mexican film star Gael Garcia Bernal (Amores Perros) is now expected to appear alongside Briton Catherine McCormack (Braveheart and Armadillo on screen and shortly to appear at the National in Honour, following stage turns there in All My Sons, Free and Dinner). Purgatory is now expected to receive its world premiere in the West End in autumn 2003.
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