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A review by ajsterkel
Copenhagen by Michael Frayn
1.0
Likes: I don’t read many stage plays because watching them is always more fun than reading them, but I thought I’d give Copenhagen a shot. It has amazing reviews and has been nominated for many, many awards. What could go wrong?
I enjoyed the historical aspect of the play. It’s based on a real meeting that occurred in 1941 between physicists Werner Heisenberg and Niels Bohr. They were both working on secret government weapons projects, and they found themselves working for opposite alliances during WWII. There is debate over what they talked about at their meeting. This play imagines the conversations they might have had. I think the “characters” are believable. They’re passionate about science, but they have complicated feelings about their actions during the war and how their work will be used by people in power. This is a play about memory, ambition, and regret.
Dislikes: So . . . unpopular opinion time: I know this play is beloved by everybody, but I struggled with it. A lot. Even though it’s short, it seems long because I got really, really bored. I think it needs actors to bring it to life. The dialogue is dry. Reading it is like reading an argument between two college professors about a topic that I don’t understand and don’t care about.
This play also has no stage directions. That made it hard to picture what was happening. The characters often talk to the audience or talk about each other like they’re not all on stage together. It’s very jarring until you get used to it.
The Bottom Line: I got bored and confused.
Do you like opinions, giveaways, and bookish nonsense? I have a blog for that.
I enjoyed the historical aspect of the play. It’s based on a real meeting that occurred in 1941 between physicists Werner Heisenberg and Niels Bohr. They were both working on secret government weapons projects, and they found themselves working for opposite alliances during WWII. There is debate over what they talked about at their meeting. This play imagines the conversations they might have had. I think the “characters” are believable. They’re passionate about science, but they have complicated feelings about their actions during the war and how their work will be used by people in power. This is a play about memory, ambition, and regret.
“We have one set of obligations to the world in general, and we have other sets, never to be reconciled, to our fellow-country men, to our neighbors, to our friends, to our family, to our children. We have to go through not two slits at the same time but twenty-two. All we can do is to look afterwards, and see what happened.” – Copenhagen
Dislikes: So . . . unpopular opinion time: I know this play is beloved by everybody, but I struggled with it. A lot. Even though it’s short, it seems long because I got really, really bored. I think it needs actors to bring it to life. The dialogue is dry. Reading it is like reading an argument between two college professors about a topic that I don’t understand and don’t care about.
This play also has no stage directions. That made it hard to picture what was happening. The characters often talk to the audience or talk about each other like they’re not all on stage together. It’s very jarring until you get used to it.
The Bottom Line: I got bored and confused.
Do you like opinions, giveaways, and bookish nonsense? I have a blog for that.