Afterword I would never have entered the idea of dramatizing Jack London’s greatest novel, if I hadn’t come across the film version of 1941 with Edward G. Robinson in an interesting interpretation of the main character, which appeared much more human than Jack London’s Nietzschean captain. The possibilities of nuancing of the role appealed to me, and I couldn’t resist attacking the issue. In the film directed by Michael Curtiz (of ’Casablanca’ and many other classics) there was also the doctor, who is not in the novel, while Ida Lupino made a captivating Maud Brewster and Alexander Knox a deeper Humphrey van Weyden. Barry Fitzgerald as the cook took the prize, though, and that character can never be made better on stage. Captain Ulv Larsen remains though the central figure, and the main interest for me in the dramatization of this unequalled sea novel has been to try to reach his humanity, which still had to be there somewhere, even if it was unreachable to Jack London.
Cape Horn after Jack London’s novel by Christian Lanciai (2010)
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