The Gains and Losses of Educating Rita

The Gains and Losses of Educating Rita

The purpose of my essay is to explain, in considerable detail, the

gains and loses of Educating Rita for it being a two-handed play.

The play, ‘Educating Rita’, written by Willy Russell is very

entertaining, although there are only two characters, hence the reason

it is a two-handed play. The grounds on which I found it entertaining

is based upon the basic plot outline which consists of Rita, a

working-class Liverpool girl, with a hunger for education and Frank,

her lecturer, attempts to do just that, but, their relationship

changes, they become close. Close in the sense by not sharing your

average perception of a student and teacher relationship. They drink

and smoke together. This soon changes when Rita’s knowledge expands

with the help of Frank and summer school. Summer school also helps to

boost Rita’s confidence enabling her to socialise with educated people

like herself. Rita divorces her husband, Denny, and gets a new flat

mate called Trish. Trish has a great influence on Rita until, she

discovered, Trish tried to commit suicide. Rita and Frank soon fall

out however; Frank still enters her for an exam. This concludes in

Rita passing her exam and fulfilling her dream of an education. She

soon becomes Frank’s friend again. Other characters, such as Trish and

Denny are never seen but talked about. All the scenes, throughout the

play, are set in the Open University where Rita is being taught.

To help me carry out this essay I watched the film, ‘Educating Rita’,

in order to identify any gains and losses for the two – handed play.

After having read the play and seen the movie I am struck by the large

number of differences. Many small details have a great impact on how

the story can and is being perceived. The movie offers a great deal of

background information on events that are relevant to the play. This

is an example of a big loss for ‘Educating Rita’ being a two-handed

play. By seeing the deleted scenes of the play you get a greater

understanding of the sequence of events. Being unable to see the

deleted scenes may have lead to confusion and misinterpretation

resulting in the play not achieving its full potential. The play is

much more predictable in the sense that numerous actions will not take

place on stage. For example, nothing taking place outside Frank's

office can be seen by the audience. All action is unavoidably confined

within the office. At the point in the play where Frank invites Rita

to his home for dinner the audience are not set up for anything