Moon for the Misbegotten: A Play in Four Acts

by Eugene O'Neill

Book Overview

The last play of O'Neill - recognized as one of his greatest theatrical achievements - a unique blend of comedy, tragedy, autobiography, and imagination. This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Mass Market Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0394712366
• ISBN13: 9780394712369
• Release Date: July 1974
• Publisher: Vintage Books USA
• Length: 128 Pages
• Weight: 0.14 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.4" x 4.2" x 6.8"

Customer Reviews

Alcohol, blackmail, regrets, and loss--and in the center of it all, an unlikely couple

O'Neill's "last" play, written and revised several times concurrently with his other four late plays, never made it to Broadway during his lifetime. After a lukewarmly received tour through the Midwest, O'Neill became dissatisfied with the production, in part because he was increasingly in poor health and also because he was never happy with the play to begin with. He finally gave up on the work, and published it with a curt, apologetic prefatory note, saying "I cannot presently give it the attention required for appropriate presentation." In spite of its inauspicious beginnings, many consider it his greatest work. I reserve that laurel for "Long Day's Journey," but of all O'Neill's works, this one reads as well on the page as it looks on the stage. Its lead character, James Tyrone, is a thinly disguised version of O'Neill's brother, who drank himself to death in a sanatorium the year after their mother died. O'Neill resurrects his brother for the theater and throws him drunkenly into the arms of an impossible match: Josie Hogan, the daughter of a tenant living on land he inherited. She is, perhaps, O'Neill's most fully fleshed female lead--literally and figuratively. Strong-willed and strong-armed, she simultaneously flaunts and scorns her reputation as a "terrible wanton woman" (an image that is more invented than real), but it is immediately obvious that her true love is Tyrone himself. The plot of the play rests on a swindle planned by Josie and her father, who mistakenly believe that Tyrone plans to sell their land to an insufferably pampered blueblood from the neighborhood. Their attempt at conning Tyrone with alcohol and blackmail, which resembles a tawdry version of every outrageous scheme concocted by Lucy Ricardo, quickly misfires as a half-comic caper that brings to all concerned a melancholy (but not exactly tragic) sense of loss and wistfulness. You can see O'Neill struggling to redeem the brother he loved but never quite understood or forgave. But it is Josie who ultimately wins the audience's affections and sympathy.

Even though my Dad designed recent production,I LOVED IT!

I loved this play the first second i saw it on broadway. it gave me vibrations all over my body every time Cherry Jones said a line. It was an amazing story of true love and to give yourself over to someyone. And talking to Hope Davis made me cry after, because she said to me "I've never seen love so strong." I do hope you give Eugene O'Neill a chance and buy this amazing play. And try to see any production of his work being broadway or smaller productions. Thank you!

RE: Discovery

Sometimes plays are rediscovered after what seems to be utter failure, a valuable insight for all, I think. O'Neill's A Moon for the Misbegotten was rejected by pre-Broadway audiences in Michigan and Ohio in the 1940s, effectively preventing the play from having a New York premiere during the author's lifetime. In each of the following two decades, attempts at New York productions failed. It took Jason Robards and Colleen Dewhurst to ignite the play for New York in the 1970s, under the direction of the legendary Jose Quintero.O'Neill's playwriting career is oddly similar to that of Sam Shepard: He had an early series of realistic short plays, followed by a period of experiment, when he explored a variety of artistic impulses and writing styles. Eventually, he wrote a handful of plays, rooted in realism, sometimes autobiographical, which revealed, nevertheless, what he'd learned through experiment. In the best of these, The Iceman Cometh, Long Day's Journey into Night, and A Moon for the Misbegotten, O'Neill built vehicles of immense emotional power with psychologically rich characters and fairly organic plots.MOON revolves around the Irish-American earth mother, Josie Hogan, a tall, rough-hewn woman, who promotes a course image of herself to cover a fragile and vulnerable interior. The other two "imposters" of the play are her father, Phil Hogan, and the landlord of their tired Connecticut farm, James Tyrone (based on O'Neill's brother), a third-rate Broadway actor, who has drunk his life away, chasing loose women and acting a fool. Nevertheless, Josie secretly harbors feelings for him. The play hinges on what happens when her father, through a clever, inebriated deception, convinces her to blackmail Tyrone into selling them the farm rather than selling it to their rich, obnoxious neighbor (for a much higher price). The subterfuge leads to one of the most poignant love scenes in American dramatic literature, as Josie and Jim Tyrone discover that they know and understand the person beneath the mask better than they each thought, and it's still not enough to unite them.O'Neill's original title for the play was The Moon Bore Twins. We can be grateful for the change, though the original title does carry a measure of insight with it, for Josie and Tyrone are, if not identical twins psychologically, at least inversions of the same chord-doomed to occupy separate, mutually exclusive worlds. The play contains an amazing shift of tone from the first half to the last half. In act one and two we are treated to a rather comic display of Irish inflected patter between Josie, her father, and the rest of the five characters. In the last two acts, the tone becomes more serious and bittersweet, which may explain why it took so long for audiences to catch up with it. The play definitely catches the viewer or reader off guard ... wishing that these two ne'er-do-wells could save each other from the future they h

Amazing

The last reviewer couldn't have said it better; this is a must read and by far definitely a MUST SEE!The current broadway production is incredible!

Incredibly Poignant

A few weeks ago I eagerly ordered this play for I had plans to see Gabriel Byrne's performance as James Tyrone, Jr. in the current Broadway run of "A Moon for the Misbegotten." I very much enjoyed reading the book. I saw the play this weekend and was incredibly moved with how the actors brought this tale to life. Gabriel Byrne's performance was particularly awesome.For those who are familiar with "A Long Day's Journey Into Night," this play follows up on the life of the eldest son/actor. I read somewhere that this was O'Neill eulogy to his real-life brother, who was the model for James Tyrone, Jr.The play is about relationships, redemption, unconditional love, regrets, and hope. In a nutshell, the story is ecumenical. Other elements of the story that contributes to its overall tapestry is the sexual current between James and Josie, the story's heroine, and O'Neill's ability to balance much needed humor with pathos.And for those who are interested in an introduction to O'Neill but are short on time, this particular play is a fast read.