Miss Julie

Synopsis

Midsummer's Eve, Sweden, 1888. The Count's daughter and his valet cross social and sexual boundaries; and must face the consequences. While the servants' party continues in the barn outside, aristocratic Miss Julie is drawn to the kitchen and to the socially ambitious Jean, her father's valet. What starts as a harmless flirtation, soon descends into a ferocious power struggle and battle of the sexes, from which neither can escape.

Our Review:

16 October 2009

It would be easy for the events of August Strindberg’s 1888 play to seem, 120 years later, a fuss about nothing. The pretty young lady of the house throws herself at a manservant, they have sex and the power balance between them changes. Should this be the cause of such hysteria, not to mention a tragic ending?

It would be even easier to forget that Miss Julie was an innovative piece, an experiment in naturalism, with its (now familiar) single arc and no division into acts. But it should still seem shocking.

These two characters can, of course, take the audience with them on their erotic rollercoaster during a Midsummer Night of misrule. They can build tension and persuade us of the inevitability of the outcome, but this doesn’t quite happen in Stephen Unwin’s production. The width of the stage, so helpful to the comedy in the Rose’s partner production, Bedroom Farce, tends here to diffuse the sense of...

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Latest User Review

David Baxter - 19 November 2009:

The Rose is a very odd theatre. With very little rake and the "pit" virtually unoccupied it resembles a modern church hall with a wide floor space separating the audience from the stage. Sir Peter Hall (looking worryingly frail) was in attendance to check on his production of Bedroom Farce and should have been delighted at the heights of comedy produced by an excellent cast. It's one of Ayckbourn's earlier plays so is blissfully funny without the darker undertones of his later work. Sir Peter has assembled a cast including three daughters of theatre aristocracy, Misses Briers, Pickup and Williams who, alongside Jane Asher, perfrom superbly as women saddled with husbands of varying degrees of idiocy. Despite the unusual setting this was an object lesson in how to perform Ayckbourn....

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