Oleanna is a two-character play by David Mamet about the power struggle between a university professor and one of his female students who accuses him of sexual harassment and, by doing so, spoils his chances of being accorded tenure. The play's title, taken from a folk song, refers to a 19th-century escapist vision of utopia^[1]. This article or section does not cite its references or sources. ... David Alan Mamet (born November 30, 1947) is an American playwright, screenwriter, director, poet, essayist and novelist. ... For a list of universities around the world, see Lists of colleges and universities Representation of a university class, 1350s. ... A professor giving a lecture The meaning of the word professor (Latin: one who claims publicly to be an expert) varies. ... Sexual harassment is harassment or unwelcome attention of a sexual nature. ... Look up tenure in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ... Oleanna is a Norwegian folk song which was translated into English and popularized in the United States by Weavers member Pete Seeger. ... Escapism is mental diversion by means of entertainment or recreation, as an escape from the perceived unpleasant aspects of daily reality. ... Left panel (The Earthly Paradise, Garden of Eden), from Hieronymus Boschs The Garden of Earthly Delights. ...

The play premiered in May 1992 in Cambridge, Massachusetts as the first production of Mamet's new Back Bay Theater Company^[2]. The premiere featured William H. Macy as John, a "smug, pompous, insufferable man whose power over academic lives he unconsciously abuses"^[2]. Rebecca Pidgeon plays the female lead, Carol, "Mamet's most fully realized female character, ...a mousy, confused cipher" whose failure to comprehend concepts and precepts presented in John's class motivated her appeal for personal instruction^[2]. The part of Carol is said to have been written for Pidgeon^[2]. See also: 1991 in literature, other events of 1992, 1993 in literature, list of years in literature. ...   Settled: 1630 â€“ Incorporated: 1636 Zip Code(s): 02138, 02139, 02140, 02141, 02142 â€“ Area Code(s): 617 / 857 Official website: http://www. ... Image:William h macy. ... Rebecca Pidgeon (born October 10, 1965) is an actress, singer, songwriter, and the wife of playwright David Mamet. ...

In October, a year after the Anita Hill - Clarence Thomas hearings^[1] which "crystallized and concretized"^[2] Mamet's dramatization, it appeared off-Broadway at New York City's Orpheum Theatre, with Macy and Pidgeon reprising their roles. The production included a rewritten third scene^[2]. Critic Frank Rich provides a summary of the play in his review of the off-Broadway production: Anita Hill Anita F. Hill (born July 30, 1956) is a professor of social policy, law, and womens studies at Brandeis University at the Heller School for Social Policy and Management and a former colleague of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas. ... Clarence Thomas (born June 23, 1948) is an American jurist and has been an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States since 1991. ... Off-Broadway plays or musicals are performed in New York City in smaller theatres than Broadway, but larger than Off-Off-Broadway, productions. ... Orpheum can mean: The Orpheum theatre in Vancouver, British Columbia The Orpheum theatre in Memphis, Tennessee The Hayden Orpheum Picture Palace in Sydney, Austrailia Orpheum Computing Solutions Many other theatres are named Orpheum. ... Image:Frank Rich. ...

Oleanna ... is an impassioned response to the Thomas hearings. As if ripped right from the typewriter, it could not be more direct in its technique or more incendiary in its ambitions. In Act I, Mr. Mamet locks one man and one woman in an office where, depending on one's point of view, an act of sexual harassment does or does not occur. In Act II, the antagonists, a middle-aged university professor and an undergraduate student, return to the scene of the alleged crime to try to settle their case without benefit of counsel, surrogates or, at times, common sense.

The result? During the pause for breath that separates the two scenes of Mr. Mamet's no-holds-barred second act, the audience seemed to be squirming and hyperventilating en masse, so nervous was the laughter and the low rumble of chatter that wafted through the house. The ensuing denouement, which raised the drama's stakes still higher, does nothing to alter the impression that "Oleanna" is likely to provoke more arguments than any play this year.^[1]

It had its London premiere at the Royal Court Theatre in 1993, directed by Harold Pinter^[3]. David Suchet played John (in a Variety Club Award-winning performance^[4]), and Lia Williams played Carol, in a version that used Mamet's original ending from the Cambridge production. As Pinter notes in personal correspondence to Mamet that Pinter also published on his website: In medicine, hyperventilation (or hyperpnea) is the state of breathing faster or deeper (hyper) than necessary, and thereby reducing the carbon dioxide concentration of the blood below normal. ... The Royal Court Theatre is a non-commercial theatre in Sloane Square, in the Chelsea area of London noted for its contributions to modern theatre. ... 1993 (MCMXCIII) was a common year starting on Friday of the Gregorian calendar and marked the Beginning of the International Decade to Combat Racism and Racial Discrimination (1993-2003). ... Harold Pinter, CH, CBE (born 10 October 1930) is a British playwright, screenwriter, poet, actor, director, author, and political activist, best known for his plays The Birthday Party (1957), The Caretaker (1959), The Homecoming (1964), and Betrayal (1978), and for his screenplay adaptations of novels by others, such as The... David Suchet as Hercule Poirot (foreground) with Hugh Fraser as Captain Arthur Hastings. ...

There can be no tougher or more unflinching play than Oleanna. The original ending is, brilliantly, "the last twist of the knife". She gets up from the floor ("Don't worry about me. I'm alright") and goes straight for the throat. The last line seems to me the perfect summation of the play. It's dramatic ice^[3].

Michael Billington, in a review published in The Guardian, endorsed Pinter's choice of ending, saying "by restoring Mamet's original ending, in which the professor is forced to confess his failings, Pinter also brings out the pain and tragedy of the situation"^[3]. Michael Billington (born on December 24, 1941 in Blackburn, Lancashire, England; died on June 3, 2005 in the UK) was a popular British film and television actor. ... The Guardian is a British newspaper owned by the Guardian Media Group. ...

Oleanna was turned into a movie directed by Mamet, starring Macy and Debra Eisenstadt. Roger Ebert, whose review of the film^[5] is primarily about the off-Broadway production he saw over a year earlier, was "astonished" to report that Oleanna was not a very good film, characterizing it as awkward and lacking in "fire and passion"; this is in contrast to what Ebert wrote about the performance of the play he saw at the Orpheum: Film adaptation is the transfer of a written work to a feature film. ... Debra Eisenstadt is an American director, writer and actress. ... Russ Meyer (left) and Roger Ebert, (1970) Roger Joseph Ebert (June 18, 1942 - ) is an Emmy Award-nominated American television personality, author, and film critic who began writing for the Chicago Sun-Times in 1967. ...

Experiencing David Mamet's play "Oleanna" on the stage was one of the most stimulating experiences I've had in a theater. In two acts, he succeeded in enraging all of the audience - the women with the first act, the men with the second. I recall loud arguments breaking out during the intermission and after the play, as the audience spilled out of an off-Broadway theater all worked up over its portrait of . . . sexual harassment? Or was it self-righteous Political Correctness?^[5]

More recently, a 2004 production^[6] at the Garrick Theatre in London, featured Aaron Eckhart and Julia Stiles^[7] and was directed by Lindsay Posner. Sexual harassment is harassment or unwelcome attention of a sexual nature. ... Political correctness is the alteration of language to redress real or alleged injustices and discrimination or to avoid offense. ... Londons Garrick Theatre was designed by Walter Emden, with CJ Phipps brought in as a consultant to help with the planning on the difficult site, which included an underground river. ... Aaron Eckhart in Possession Aaron E. Eckhart (born March 12, 1968) is an American film actor. ... Julia OHara Stiles (born March 28, 1981) is an American stage and screen actress. ...

References

1. ^ ^{a b c} Mamet's New Play Detonates The Fury of Sexual Harassment, an October 26, 1992 review by Frank Rich of The New York Times
2. ^ ^{a b c d e f} Oleanna debuts at Cambridge Mass., from the website of the David Mamet Society
3. ^ ^{a b c} Oleanna by David Mamet, The Royal Court Theatre, 24 June 1993, from the official Harold Pinter website
4. ^ Suchet: Dark star, a June 2002 BBC article
5. ^ ^{a b} Ebert's review of the film version of Oleanna, from the Chicago Sun-Times website
6. ^ Stiles and Eckhart to Clash In London Oleanna, Opening April 22, a 2004 Playbill article
7. ^ Review of Oleanna from The Guardian

Image:Frank Rich. ... The New York Times is a newspaper published in New York City by Arthur Ochs Sulzberger Jr. ... Harold Pinter, CH, CBE (born 10 October 1930) is a British playwright, screenwriter, poet, actor, director, author, and political activist, best known for his plays The Birthday Party (1957), The Caretaker (1959), The Homecoming (1964), and Betrayal (1978), and for his screenplay adaptations of novels by others, such as The... The British Broadcasting Corporation, usually known as the BBC (and also informally known as the Beeb or Auntie) is one of the largest broadcasting corporations in the world in terms of audience numbers, employing 26,000 staff in the UK alone and with a budget of more than £4 billion. ... The Chicago Sun-Times is an American daily newspaper published in Chicago. ... The cover of the Playbill issue about The Producers. ... The Guardian is a British newspaper owned by the Guardian Media Group. ...

See also

• Sexual harassment in education
• Pretty Persuasion

Sexual harassment in education is unwelcome behavior of a sexual nature that interferes with a student’s ability to learn, study, work or participate in school activities. ... Pretty Persuasion is a 2005 comedy / drama / teen film directed by Marcos Siega and written by Skander Halim. ...

External links

• Study Guide for Oleanna from SparkNotes
• Text of the play from a Burlington County College website
• History is Written by the Winners, a critical analysis of Oleanna by playwright N.G. McClernan