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THE OSCHOLARS
THE PICTURE OF DORIAN GRAY
Of all Wilde’s works, The Picture of Dorian Gray has been the most adapted (as distinct from produced) for
stage and screen. These adaptations form a subgenre which deserve study as such.
FILMS
(including television films)
Axel Strøm: Dorian Grays Portræt, Denmark 1910
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Phillips Smalley: The Picture of Dorian Gray, USA 1913
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Vsevolod Meyerhold: Portret Doryana Greya, Russia 1915
Marcel L’Herbier: Le Portrait de Dorian Gray, France 1923
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Albert Lewin: The Picture of Dorian Gray, USA 1945
Glenn Jordan: The Picture of Dorian Gray, USA 1973
Massimo Dallamano: Dorian Gray, West Germany 1973
Tony Maylam: The Sins of Dorian Gray, USA 1987
David Rosenbaum: The Picture of Dorian Gray, USA 1999
Allan A. Goldstein: Dorian, USA 2002
Vincent Kirk: Dorian, USA 2006
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Duncan Roy: The Picture of Dorian Gray, USA 2007
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Oliver Parker: Dorian Gray, 2009
STAGE VERSIONS
There have been so many of these as to constitute a fifth Society play by Wilde. There was a version produced
in Vienna as early as 1906 (though it was not played there again until Glen Walfords English Theatre
production in 2001), followed by Edwards Davis’ version at the Temple Theatre, Detroit in 1910 and the G.
Constant Lounsbery / Lou Tellegan version at the Vaudeville Theatre, London in 1913. Among the more
unexpected versions one can list the Finnish (Kuopion Kaupunginteatteri, Kuopino 1989), the Romanian
(Odeon, Bucharest and elsewhere, directed by Dragos Galgotiu from 2004) and the Russian, by Vladimir
Zakharov, directed at the Mironov Theater, St Petersburg, by Vlad Furman in 1998.

In Wilde’s native Dublin, it was first staged in 1945 at the Gate Theatre in a version by Micheál
MacLíammóir and directed by Hilton Edwards, with revivals in 1956 in Limerick, Clonmel and
even Cairo. Subsequently, it was produced at Players Theatre, Dublin in 1992, at the New Theatre,
Dublin in 2009 and at the Abbey Theatre, Dublin 2012, directed respectively by Jo Mangan, Darya
Gauthier (Darya Gerasimenko) and Neil Bartlett. In Belfast it has been directed by Sam MacCready
at the Arts Theatre, 1989. Alice Coghlan directed the play for Wonderland Productions at seven
venues in Ireland between 2010 and 2015.

Georges Pitoëff directed a French version by Fernand Nozière at the Comédie des Champs-Élysées,
Paris 1922; and there were productions directed by Pierre Boutron at the Théâtre des Celestins,
Lyons in 1975, by Diane Belmont, Au Bec Fin, Paris in 2000 and by Alain Mollot by at the Comédie
de Picardie, Amiens in 2004.

Patrice Mincke directed a version by Fabrice Gardin and Patrice Mincke at the Théâtre Royal des
Galeries, Brussels in 2014.

The Bare & Ragged Theatre Company brought a version to the Edinburgh Fringe Festival in 1995,
1996, 1997, and 1998.

Between December 1909 and March 2010, the American Drama Group Europe toured a version
directed by Paul Stebbings. This was played in 43 cities.

A Spanish adaptation by Fernando Savater was directed by Maria Ruiz, Centro Cultural de la Villa,
Madrid in 2005.

John Osborne’s version was directed by Joseph Ziegler at the Stratford Shakespeare Festival,
Stratford, Ontario 2000

There have been a number of American versions. David Thorne directed at the Biltmore Theatre,
New York, 1928; while in 1936 the Comedy Theatre, New York, mounted two productions: one by
Jeron Criswell, directed by Groves Quigley, and Cecil Clarke’s The Life and Loves of Dorian Gray,
directed by Annette Schein. There then seems to have been a long interval before Daniel Frezza’s
version at the Pittsburgh Irish & Classical Theatre, directed by W. Stephen Coleman in 1999 and,
in 2000, a version directed by Mark Cole at Oswego State University, NY. It was adapted and
directed by Joe O'Byrne for the Irish Repertory Theatre, New York 2001. An adaption by Roberto
Aguirre-Sacasa was directed by Blake Robison at the Round House Theatre, Bethesda, Maryland
in 2009; Darya Gauthier’s version, noted above in Dublin, was produced at Theatre Row, New
York 2013. Ben Lobpries’ Dorian was performed at the Chopin Theatre, Chicago in 2014.

London versions: Jack De Leon directed Constance Cox’s adaptation at the Q Theatre in 1947. Giles
Havergal directed an adaptation by Walter Hartley and David Pamely at the Palace Theatre,
Watford in 1967; Clive Donner directed John Osborne’s version at the Greenwich Theatre in 1975.
Ronald Selwyn Phillips’ version has been produced twice at the Baron’s Court Theatre, directed
by Doug Rollins 1994 and by Simon Guiver in 1997. Also in London: The Innocence of Dorian Gray,
directed by Andrew O’Callaghan at the Hen & Chickens in Highbury, 1994 and the version at the
Westminster Theatre directed by David Evans Rees in 2000.

Further afield in England and Wales, there have been two productions at the Oxford Playhouse,
directed by Peter Harness in 2002 and, adapted by Lucinda Dawkins and Adam Scott Taylor, by
Edmund Singer-Kingsmith 2011. Roger Parsley’s version opened at the Sewell Barn Theatre,
Norwich in 1998. It is also necessary to note Keith Drinkel’s one-man version directed by John
Jones that has toured in England since opening at the Brewhouse Theatre and Arts Centre, Taunton
in 2000.

European Arts Company’s production, directed by Jonathan Kemp, toured 50 venues in England
& Wales, including a week at the Greenwich Theatre, London, in 2008, then, directed by John
O’Connor, opened at the Teatro Politeama in Genoa in October 2013 and toured all over Italy until
March 2014. With the collaboration of Merlin Holland, it then toured to 22 venues in Britain in
2015.
MUSIC VERSIONS
The Picture of Dorian Gray has also been adapted as an opera, a ballet, a musical ...
(a) OPERA
Composer
Charles Flick-Steger
Place
Czechoslovakia
Date
1930
Hans Leger
1939
Hans Schaeuble
1947-48, revised 1962 and
1974-75*
Robert Hanell
Staatsoper, Dresden
1962
Hans Kox (b. 1930) †
The Netherlands
1974
Lowell Liebermann
Monte Carlo
1996
Jeffrey
Longwood Opera, Needham, MA
2011 ††
Brody
and James
Saslow
* The plans for a complete world premiere in February 2003 by the University of North
Texas College of Music, co-sponsored by the university's Center for Schenkerian Studies
with financial support from the Hans Schaeuble Foundation were abandoned in 2002.
—see http://www.unt.edu/resource/previousissues/20012002/newsbriefs.htm
† premiered in The Hague by the Netherlands Opera Foundation (see Willem Frederik
Bon, ‘Hans Kox' Opera Dorian Gray’, Sonorum Speculum 54 [1973]: 4-14).
†† http://www.longwoodopera.org/images/dorian-gray/saslow.html
(b) BALLET
Composer /
Place
Date
Choreographer
Max
Lang
/
Vaslav
Switzerland
1964
London
2008 ‡
Orlikowski
Terry Davies / Matthew
Bourne
‡ http://www.sadlerswells.com/show/Matthew-Bournes-Dorian-Gray-09#title
(c) MUSICALS
Varkonyi Matyas
Budapest
1990 §
Richard Gleaves
Goodspeed Opera House
1997
East Haddam, CT
Paul Keusseyan (libretto) ;
2015
François Irlès (music) §§
and Bloomsbury Theatre London 1995
§ Under the title Flawless. For more on this new work, please click the image below.
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