Love, Genius and a Walk
Theatro Technis, April 7th – May 2nd 2020
LGW Productions are delighted to bring to the stage the fascinating story of composer and conductor Gustav Mahler, written by the New York Writer Gay Walley and directed by Leah Townley. The story explores the theories of Sigmund Freud, who Mahler met, together with Mahler’s approach to composing and how this might have physically manifested itself. This includes a focus on his relationship with his wife Alma, an amazing woman and composer in her own right. The play also contrasts the role of women in the 19th century with the character of a female writer in contemporary scenes.
“it is lonely to be an artist and lonely to love an artist” A Younger Theatre
Love, Genius and a Walk is a play that shows how art and marriage can make odd bedfellows. Gustav Mahler, world-renowned composer and conductor, wants his wife to be his muse, but Alma desires the closeness that he cannot give, he thinks, in order to get his work done. Mahler turns to the psychoanalyst Sigmund Freud for guidance, and both men find that neither of them may be that clued up about women.
At the same time, a modern couple’s life mirrors Alma and Mahler’s, except here she is the artist who works all the time, and their conundrum is a commercially-oriented husband whose thoughts on art can be a touch confounding. The two stories twist and turn through the quagmires of love and genius, much of it to the sweeping music of Mahler.
Love, Genius and a Walk toured the UK in 2019, and was nominated for 6 prizes, including Best Play, at the Midtown Festival in New York. It now returns to London in a new creative production by director Leah Townley
“sparkier, tighter and left the audience with plenty to think about” View from the Cheap Seat
Mahler’s music form an integral part of the rhythm of the show, using a grand piano on stage to connect with the audience and strongly influence the mood, alongside slick design moving between the contemporary scenes and the rest of the play.