Amy's View (Classic Radio Theatre)

by David Hare

It is 1979. Esme Allen is a well-known West End actress at just the moment when the West End is ceasing to offer actors a regular way of life. The visit of her young daughter, Amy, with a new boyfriend sets in train a series of events which only find their shape eighteen years later. A generational play about the long term struggle between a strong mother and her loving daughter, Amy's View mixes love, death and the theatre in a way which is both heady and original.

• ISBN10: 0571191797
• ISBN13: 9780571191796
• Publish Date: 23 June 1997
• Publish Status: Active
• Publish Country: GB
• Imprint: Faber & Faber
• Edition: Main
• Format: Paperback (B-Format (198x129 mm))
• Pages: 144
• Language: English

Reviews

[brokentune]

The best thing about this audiobook was that it was a full cast production of Amy's View with two of my favourites: Judi Dench and Samantha Bond.

Incidentally, the last time I saw a play by David Hare, it also starred Dame Judi.

Unfortunately, and this may be an indictment of the effects that Hare's play have on me, I can't remember the title of the play or what it was about. In fact, only weeks after listening to Amy's View, I can hardly remember what the story of the play was and whether it had a message to convey.

In short, the performance was great, but there is little substance to the play.

I would love to give a summary but all I can remember is that the play is about a dysfunctional family and focuses on the relationship between an actress mother and her daughter, and later with her son-in-law. The mother disapproves of the daughter's relationship with an art critic and this causes a rift between the women which reveals their life's illusions. Blah, blah, blah....