Miss Julie features a terrific cast. Kate Box brings strength, stature and dazzling talent to one of the great female roles of the theatrical canon.
James Lugton harnesses brute sexuality and menace in the role of Jean and Sophie Gregg brings grace and strength to the role of Kristen. In one of the surprises of this production, the usually small role of Kristen, underwritten in the original, has been reworked to startling effect.
Originally set on the eve of Midsummer 1888 on the estate of a Swedish Count, Miss Julie, the Count’s daughter, Jean, her father’s oldest and most faithful attendant and Kristen the cook become part of a dangerous and irreversible game.
This Miss Julie is literally exploding out of her century, raging against the constrictions of class, gender and the damage of her traumatic upbringing. Working together as writers for the first time, Sved and Box’s aim has been to make the play’s psychology resonate for a contemporary audience.
Sved and Box’s exciting new version for Darlinghurst Theatre Company examines this sado-masochistic play through the prism of the 21st century while maintaining a conversation with the 19th century parameters from which the play originated.
Sved says of Miss Julie, “Strindberg was writing in a time of huge cultural transition – his characters are struggling to feel a sense of wholeness and purpose – their despair and madness is so palpable and recognszable today.”
Gender issues may have become more complex in the modern world and juggling expectations and roles more challenging, but the themes and overwhelming tensions of Strindberg’s play remain strikingly potent. His complex characters push their psyches to the outer limits and – like the playwright himself – rail against societal expectations.