(Chris Jones’s article appeared in the Chicago Tribune, 5/15.)
Given that Edward Albee's “The Goat or, Who is Sylvia?” probes the outer limits of intimacy, there is much to be gained from an intimate exploration of its themes.
The last major Chicago production of this play about an accomplished, middle-age, hitherto happily married man who finds himself in both love and sexual congress with a cloven-hoofed mammal was at the Goodman Theatre in 2003. Robert Falls' epic version emphasized the connection of this family drama to the thunderous emotions and language of classical tragedy. Those connections are certainly there: Albee's use of two- and three-person scenes; the way the play combines studied intellectualism and primal cries of anguish; the characters' unstinting determination to self-justify; the horrific, violent end.