''Beautiful Child'' is a drama by American playwright

Nicky Silver Nicky Silver is an American playwright. Formerly of Philadelphia, he resides in London. Many of his plays have been produced off-Broadway, and also at the Woolly Mammoth Theatre Company in Washington, D.C. Biography Early life Silver was born in ...

. It premiered

Off-Broadway An off-Broadway theatre is any professional theatre venue in New York City with a seating capacity between 100 and 499, inclusive. These theatres are smaller than Broadway theatres, but larger than off-off-Broadway theatres, which seat fewer th ...

in 2004.

Production

''Beautiful Child'' premiered at the

Vineyard Theatre The Vineyard Theatre is an Off-Broadway non-profit theatre company, located at 108 East 15th Street in Manhattan, New York City, near Union Square. Its first production was in 1981. It is best known for its productions of the Tony award-winnin ...

in New York on February 24, 2004 (previews from February 6) and ran to March 28. Directed by

Terry Kinney Terry Kinney (born January 29, 1954) is an American actor and theater director, and is a founding member of the Steppenwolf Theatre Company, with John Malkovich, Laurie Metcalf, Gary Sinise, and Jeff Perry. Kinney is best known for his role as E ...

the cast featured

George Grizzard George Cooper Grizzard Jr. (April 1, 1928 – October 2, 2007) was an American stage, television, and film actor. He was the recipient of a Grammy Award, a Primetime Emmy Award and a Tony Award, among other accolades. Life and career Grizzard ...

Alexandra Gersten-Vassilaros Alexandra I. Gersten-Vassilaros (born 1960) is an American playwright and actress. She is the co-author, with Theresa Rebeck, of Omnium Gatherum which was a finalist for the 2004 Pulitzer Prize for Drama. Gersten-Vassilaros is a graduate of NYU ...

, and

Penny Fuller A penny is a coin ( pennies) or a unit of currency (pl. pence) in various countries. Borrowed from the Carolingian denarius (hence its former abbreviation d.), it is usually the smallest denomination within a currency system. Presently, it is th ...

Plot

Harry and Nan, a middle-aged couple, are constantly at odds. Harry is having an affair with his emotionally unstable secretary. "Your secretary, Harry?" snipes Nan. "You're past cliché and into archetype." This tone of acid comedy is replaced, however, by deep anguish, when their adult son, Isaac, announces that he has fallen in love with a child. He wants to return home and live with his parents, who have to struggle between their love for him and their guilt and horror at his transgression. They finally come to a compromise, which is almost as shocking as Isaac's offense: he can live with them, but must be blinded first, to keep him from ever being attracted to another boy.

Critical response

Reviews were mixed. Most reviewers were struck by its similarity to

Edward Albee Edward Franklin Albee III ( ; March 12, 1928 – September 16, 2016) was an American playwright known for works such as '' The Zoo Story'' (1958), '' The Sandbox'' (1959), '' Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?'' (1962), '' A Delicate Balance'' (196 ...

's recent international success, ''

The Goat, or Who is Sylvia? ''The Goat, or Who Is Sylvia?'' is a full-length play written in 2000 by Edward Albee which opened on Broadway in 2002. It won the 2002 Tony Award for Best Play, the 2002 Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Play, and was a finalist for the 2003 ...

'', and indeed, ''The Goat'' and ''Beautiful Child'' are similar in their explorations of sexual transgression in affluent domestic settings, as well as their edgy amalgams of comedy and horror. Some critics, like Adrienne Onofri, dismissed Silver's play as a poor imitation of Albee Others, like Simon Stoltzman, acknowledged the similarity to Albee's work, but found Silver's approach distinctive. Penny Fuller and George Grizzard were widely praised for their performances. Reviewer Dan Bacalzo observed, "Grizzard has the uncanny ability to convey volumes with a murmured word or dismissive gesture."

Ben Brantley Benjamin D. Brantley (born October 26, 1954) is an American theater critic, journalist, editor, publisher and writer. He served as the chief theater critic for ''The New York Times'' from 1996 to 2017, and as co-chief theater critic from 2017 to ...

in his ''

New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...

'' review called the play a "grim comic drama", and wrote: "Swerving from the brittle, accusatory dialogue of a bitterly married couple to a scene of ritualistic sacrifice à la Sophocles, Mr. Silver has composed an ambitious but ungainly answer to Edward Albee's plays of domestic existentialism, works like 'A Delicate Balance' and 'All Over.' Ultimately 'Beautiful Child' isn't much more than ersatz Albee."Brantley, Ben.
"Theater Review. A Troubled Marriage and the Trouble With Junior"
''The New York Times'', February 25, 2004

Notes

{{reflist

External links

Internet Off-Broadway database listing
Plays by Nicky Silver 2004 plays