The Broadway Theatre Review: Sydney Theatre Company’s The Picture of Dorian Gray on Broadway

By Ross

“How sad it is!” murmured Dorian Gray with his eyes still fixed upon his own portrait. “How sad it is! I shall grow old, and horrible, and dreadful. But this picture will remain always young. It will never be older than this particular day of June…. If it were only the other way! If it were I who was to be always young, and the picture that was to grow old! For that—for that—I would give everything! Yes, there is nothing in the whole world I would not give! I would give my soul for that!” – Oscar Wilde’s The Picture of Dorian Gray

She sits, somewhat in the center of it all, but not exactly in plain sight. A smile of pleasure floats across her face as she smokes, although we only see it as presented in large projected format in front and above the seated actor, rotating from one character to another, telling the artist that this is his “best work” yet. And in a way, it truly is, but in a broader, more theatrical way. The look in those eyes, and somewhere in the craftiness of her voice, we discover something supremely calculated, shifting with ease from one framing to another, twisting the sound to fill whichever character required with personality and intention. It’s an astonishing feat, this seemingly flippant flipping in Sydney Theatre Company‘s The Picture of Dorian Gray at Broadway’s The Music Box which magically draws us in completely, falling most brilliantly on the energetic elasticity of the one and only Sarah Snook (“Succession“; Old Vic’s The Master Builder), who has taken over that wide stage and given us far more than one could ever imagine emulating out from just one singular sensation.

Based upon the 1891 gothic horror novel by famed writer Oscar Wilde (The Importance of Being Earnest), the staged one-person play, The Picture of Dorian Gray, in a new adaptation written and directed with unending force by Kip Williams (STC’s Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde), runs in strong on the energetic force of its own beautiful creation. It’s gorgeously rendered and majestically redefined, mainly because of the elastic Snook and the technological wizardry that surrounds her performance. Digging into the themes of societal values around beauty and privilege, and how they intersect with morality and influence, the reimagined piece soars and winks in delight. And what better way to examine the culture of superficiality and moral hypocrisy than through the video lens of a camera, and all the ways we can play with the filtered view of oneself and how we can present this orchestrated mask to the world.

Snook is breathlessly magnificent, shape-shifting and running laps around the stage, rarely getting a moment of peace and tranquility. Sometimes obscured by the large majestic set pieces and altered by the marvellously inventive costumes, both designed strongly by Marg Horwell (Melbourne Theatre Company’s Bernhardt/Hamlet), Snook embodies character after character with subtle precision, inventively projected across floating screens that layer visuals of herself with other versions of Snook from pre-recorded morsels. Creating a whole new framework of theatricality, designed impeccably by David Bergman (STC’s Dear Evan Hansen) with solid help from lighting designer Nick Schlieper (STC’s production of Beckett’s Happy Days) and sound design/composer Clemence Williams (STC’s Dracula), the effect is hypnotic but almost overwhelming in its fever-pitch framing, with the actor sometimes running up and down breathlessly yelling lines and narration at a singularly frantic tone and volume.

When Snook is given space to charm us with sexy glances worthy of the worship suggested, the one-person adaptation soars to heightened states of impressiveness. Yet, after spending far too much time under Lord Henry’s tutelage around never forgoing the possibility of pleasure and validation, we watch Dorian fall deep and fast into a pit of hyperventilation and obsessiveness that overwhelms the words and the story. The cautionary tale about the dangers of succumbing to the temptations of hedonism spins out like a fevered dream where the technology can’t even keep up with the raging and ranting in the underworld. And in those moments, our focus sometimes wanders away, forgetting where to look and who to care for.

Generally the technology utilized by the team, courtesy of all those wildly talented camera operators; clew, Luka Kain, Natalie Rich, Benjamin Sheen, and Dara Woo, enhances the captivating formula, distorting the ideals of beauty with a telling nod to our current obsession with youth and beauty, regardless of how obviously AI’d it is. The dinner party is particularly spectacular, including the cute dog that sits underneath the table by one woman’s feet. Yet sometimes the humour of the piece is being forced out of the video set-ups, and not the language or morality tale, which feels too cheeky and easy for such a well-formulated piece of theatre aimed at unpacking such solidly important themes, such as gender roles, homoerotic notions, male beauty, art, the consequences of vanity and the false front that we present to the world. The production almost felt unsure that it would be enough to hold us, but the ideas presented are fascinating enough, and when it does slow itself down, in the Redwood forest framing, we are hooked and caught in its web of themes and tragedy.

Sydney Theatre Company‘s The Picture of Dorian Gray magnificently and passionately unpacks a psychological storm that resonates far beyond the stage. And anyone who has read “The Velvet Rage” can’t help but see and feel the implications and parallels that run rampant through the piece. How the false presented self, based on shame, internalized hate, and insecurity, can tear apart a person’s world, even though it was insecurely created to hold onto love and acceptance. Hiding our authentic self from the world, and only presenting a perfected front that doesn’t really show the world who we really are, is a formula for internal destruction, as it is based on shame and internal dysfunction. The person will forever be searching for endless external validation from the outside world for a mask that they know is not their true internal self. And there’s never a sense of true self-worth when we rely on only external validation for our manufactured false self, like Instagram likes. Or, as truly comes alive in this production, Dorian Gray’s constant pursuit of narcissistic pleasure and seductive validation-seeking in art and life over the personal responsibility and moral accountability in navigating the complexities of human existence. This is where the true heart and splendor of this majestic reformulation of Oscar Wilde’s The Picture of Dorian Gray resides, as presented here most dynamically on Broadway by the Sydney Theatre Company.