Fraulein Julie

Synopsis

Strindberg's tragedy is re-imagined for the digital age as theatrical performance and film converge, lending fresh perspective to a classic story. Aristocratic Julie and Jean, a servant in her household, are entangled in a sexually charged game. But as their dangerous pursuit escalates, this production finds a new focus. For it is Jean's fianc?e, Kristin, a cook of few words, who is given a voice in this moving adaptation that uses real-time film and live sound effects to track the life-changing events through her eyes.

Our Review:

Michael Coveney - 1 May 2013

You could write a book about performances of Miss Julie, probably in recent years the most adapted classic of the modern repertoire, and Katie Mitchell's meticulous, slow-moving new version for the Schaubühne Berlin at the Barbican would merit a substantial chapter.

So, of course, would Patrick Marber's brilliant post-war austerity-era update, and the South African sex wars and land-owning version lately seen at the Riverside Studios. The play's been hi-jacked and syringed with conceptual overload.

Mitchell, abetted by her regular video film collaborator, Leo Warner, has at least done something genuinely different. Sticking with the late 19th century setting period, she's taken the hints on intensified realism in Strindberg's own writings to create a sort of film-with-sound-score-and-stage-effects mélange in a beautifully lit conservatory where the axis of interest moves to the figure of t...

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