Tony, Olivier, Emmy and Golden Globe winner Bryan Cranston ("Breaking Bad," All the Way) makes his "electrifying" (The New York Times) return to Broadway in the National Theatre's critically acclaimed production of Network, now a New York Times Critic's Pick.
In Lee Hall's adaptation of Paddy Chayefsky's Academy Award-winning film, anchorman Howard Beale (Cranston) unravels live on-screen. But when the ratings soar, the network seizes on its newfound prophet, and Howard becomes the biggest thing on TV.
"You owe yourself the thrill of watching Bryan Cranston in Network," raves Ben Brantley of The New York Times. Tony and Olivier winner Ivo van Hove (A View From the Bridge) directs this unique, immersive multimedia spectacle, also starring Tony Goldwyn ("Scandal") and Emmy Award winner Tatiana Maslany ("Orphan Black").
Catch the must-see theatrical event of the season, now through June 8.
In the case of 'Network,' Lee Hall's stage version of the 1976 Paddy Chayefsky-Sidney Lumet film about a network anchorman (played in the film by Peter Finch and onstage by Bryan Cranston) who cracks up midway through the evening news and starts telling the truth, the frosting has been whipped up by Ivo van Hove, Europe's most pretentious stage director. Working in close collaboration with Jan Versweyveld, the scenic and lighting designer, and Tal Yarden, the video designer, Mr. Van Hove has given us a TV-screens-and-Plexiglas production that looks thoroughly postmodern. The catch is that Mr. Hall's script, set in 1975, is a faithful adaptation of Chayefsky's screenplay, a once-prescient satire of the dumbed-down future of broadcast news. All of Chayefsky's predictions having long since come to pass, 'Network' is thus a musty period piece: The bomb has already gone off.
Bryan Cranston, who could do no wrong as Walter White in 'Breaking Bad' (and a Tony winner for 'All the Way'), burrows deep under the skin of Howard Beale here: the furrowed brow, the anxious angularity, the searching eyes all indicate a person in extremis. But it's the voice that really makes us feel - and fear - for Beale. Beneath the mellifluous tones of Cranston's professional 'newsman' delivery we can hear the agitated rasp and incipient howl of a person who's cracking up.
2017 | West End |
National Theatre World Premiere West End |
2018 | Broadway |
Original Broadway Production Broadway |
Year | Ceremony | Category | Nominee |
---|---|---|---|
2019 | Drama League Awards | Distinguished Performance Award | Bryan Cranston |
2019 | Drama League Awards | Outstanding Production of a Broadway or Off-Broadway Play | Network |
2019 | Outer Critics Circle Awards | Outstanding Actor in a Play | Bryan Cranston |
2019 | Outer Critics Circle Awards | Outstanding New Broadway Play | Network |
2019 | Outer Critics Circle Awards | Outstanding Projection Design | Tal Yarden |
2019 | Outer Critics Circle Awards | Outstanding Sound Design | Eric Sleichim |
2019 | Tony Awards | Best Direction of a Play | Ivo van Hove |
2019 | Tony Awards | Best Lighting Design of a Play | Jan Versweyveld |
2019 | Tony Awards | Best Performance by an Actor in a Leading Role in a Play | Bryan Cranston |
2019 | Tony Awards | Best Scenic Design of a Play | Jan Versweyveld |
2019 | Tony Awards | Best Sound Design of a Play | Eric Sleichim |
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