Matthew Bourne's Dorian Gray

Matthew Bourne's Dorian Gray

Matthew Bourne's Dorian Gray

Taken from the admonitory novel by Oscar Wilde this production tells the story of an exceptionally handsome young man – Dorian Gray who conceals an altogether darker side.  This is a warning about the duplicity of beauty and how things are not always what they seem.

In Oscar Wilde’s novel The Picture of Dorian Gray, we explore the dualism of beauty and ugliness: beauty is represented by Dorian Gray’s captivating looks whilst ugliness is represented by his pursuit of debauchery and depravity.  In the novel, a painting of Gray shows his wicked, corrupt behaviour by ageing in a most ghastly manner, whilst Dorian Gray himself appears to have the secret of eternal youth.

This production is set in the present day, in the contemporary art world and modern day politics where image is everything.  In this shallow, pleasure-seeking world, Dorian Gray is a male model who adorns every billboard and poster in town.  Here he is the poster boy for a well known brand of perfume whose career is managed by a powerful female magazine editor and her equally ambitious photographer. 

Gray is a hedonist, only interested in the pursuit of pleasure at whatever cost.  He is also, unbeknown to others, a corrupting influence, arrogant, self-seeking and selfish who as a result of his celebrity status has become a ‘monster’.     

In a headlong journey of drugs, bisexual affairs and excess, he ends up murdering the photographer who has helped to immortalise him.  This single act appears to release his inner demon or a ‘serial killer’ in which he commits many more murders. 

Is he a victim of our obsession with celebrity status, with fame, fortune and glamour or is he simply a psychopathic killer?

This is Matthew Bourne’s first new production for three years with the hit team of designer Lez Brotherston, composer Terry Davies and lighting designer Paule Constable, who created the award winning ‘Play Without Words’.