Movie Review – Who's Afraid of Virginia Wolfe?

Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolfe? (1966) – A middle aged couple, George (Richard Burton) and Martha (Elizabeth Taylor), have a relationship based on verbal abuse, alcohol and broken dreams.  Once upon a time he was an up and coming history professor and she was the beautiful daughter of the college president.  Today they are vicious antagonists hiding behind the thinnest veneer of civility.  Into the grinder of that relationship come the new man in the Math department, Nick (George Segal) and his mousy wife, Honey (Sandy Dennis).  By the light of dawn all of them will find some of their most personal secrets laid bare.

Not an evening of light entertainment, for the characters or the viewers.  This is intense, character driven movie magic as Burton and Taylor take the characters from the award winning Broadway play (by Edward Albee) and explode them on the big screen.  The movie would be nominated in every single category at the Academy Awards (only one other movie managed that by 1966).  Out of the thirteen nominations it would win five, including for both Taylor and Dennis.  Taylor was at the height of her fame and beauty but agreed to put on thirty pounds for the role.  It’s also an interesting side note that both acting couples were married in real life as well.

While it’s not fluffy, light entertainment it is stunning at at times wryly funny.  Albee’s dialogue comes at machine gun pace with bitter witticisms and a level of obscenity that was stunning at the time.  It’s still pretty impressive.  In the hands of a cast of this quality the movie simply roars through your consciousness.  No topic and no person is sacrosanct.  It is simply brilliant.

This was another pivotal movie in pulling Hollywood free of the Production Code era.  It was originally believed to be so obscene that it could never be made into a movie.  Various self appointed censorship groups were outraged but Warner Brothers plowed ahead.  This movie, along with Antonioni’s “Blow Up” would be the impetus to create the current rating system (which is an abomination but that’s another story for another day).

A great script (adapted by Ernest Lehman) in the hands of brilliant young director (Mike Nichols debut) with a stellar cast creates a claustrophobic, intense film classic.

Rating – ***** Highest Recommendation