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‘The Picture of Dorian Gray’ Review: Sarah Snook’s Solo Broadway Outing Can’t Find Meaning in the Artifice
The "Succession" Emmy winner's solo Broadway outing, staged by Kip Williams, can't find meaning in its artifice.
It’s a missed opportunity not to set this production in modern day, which could have allowed it to make more nuanced points about social media and its relationship to gender, sexuality, aging, self-image, body dysmorphia, and the glorification of youth and beauty. Her Dorian sounds like a British child in an SNL skit; her “narrator” is a farce of a stuffy English voice-over; her Basil has a shaky stutter; and her minor characters have such exaggerated vocal inflections it appears the only inspiration was to get laughs. Just as Wilde’s novel was censored by its original editor, the play removes some of the most clearly queer passages, including when Basil admits to Dorian, “It is quite true I have worshipped you with far more romance of feeling than a man should ever give to a friend.
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