Liliom - Stage and Radio Adaptations

Stage and Radio Adaptations

In 1939, Orson Welles directed and played the title role in a one-hour radio adaptation for his CBS Campbell Playhouse program ; the production co-starred Helen Hayes as Julie and Agnes Moorehead as Mrs. Muskat, the carousel owner who is infatuated with Lilliom. It was broadcast live on October 10, 1939. The recording made from the broadcast still exists and can even be heard online.

In 1940, a second American stage revival, starring Burgess Meredith and Ingrid Bergman, with Elia Kazan as Ficsúr and Joan Tetzel as Liliom and Julie's daughter Louise, played New York.

In 1945, at the suggestion of the Theatre Guild (which had produced the 1921 and 1932 productions of Liliom as well as the original Oklahoma!), Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein II wrote Carousel, an American musical adaptation of the play. This was also produced by the Theatre Guild and became one of the great classics of musical theatre. Even though the musical adaptation took liberties with Molnár's play, changing the ending so that the ex-barker is successful in trying to help his daughter upon his return to Earth, Molnár applauded Carousel. The character of Liliom's daughter, Louise, is made more poignant in the musical, in which she is snobbishly taunted and rejected because her father was a thief. It is the Liliom character who finally gives her the confidence she needs to face life. In Carousel, the characters of Marie and Wolf Beifeld in Liliom become Carrie Pipperidge and Mr. Snow, and Snow, a fisherman in the musical, is made even more pompous than in the original play. Carrie and Mr. Snow's children are the ones who so viciously taunt Louise, although, in order to keep Carrie a sympathetic character, Hammerstein keeps her totally unaware of this; in contrast to Mr. Snow, she is even supportive of a potential budding romantic relationship between their eldest son and Louise. (The relationship is quickly cut short, however, when Snow's son insults Louise by stating outright that marrying her would be "beneath his station.") Both Carrie and Mr. Snow are made into rather comical figures (especially the feather-brained Carrie) in the musical, in contrast to the completely serious Marie and Wolf Beifeld in Liliom.

Carousel also Americanizes the story, setting it in Maine during the last part of the nineteenth century, and including a New England clambake as the setting for some of the more cheerful songs in the show. The names of most of the other characters were changed as well. Liliom became Billy Bigelow, the criminal Fiscúr became Jigger Craigin, and Mother Hollunder, the boarding house keeper, became Julie's cousin Nettie. There is no Carpenter in Carousel.

There is an added layer of social commentary in Liliom which is deliberately omitted from Carousel. The intended holdup victim in Molnar's play, a payroll clerk named Linzman, is Jewish, as is Wolf Beifeld. In Carousel, Linzman becomes Mr. Bascombe, the wealthy owner of the cotton mill at which Julie once worked.

In Liliom, Liliom encounters Linzman only once: during the robbery. In Carousel, Billy Bigelow has met Bascombe much earlier during the play. Bascombe finds him and Julie together and kindly offers not to fire Julie, who has stayed out past the mill workers' curfew, if she allows him (Bascombe) to take her back to the mill. She gently refuses.

However, many elements of Liliom are retained faithfully in Carousel, an unusual step in the 1940s for a musical play based on such a serious drama. Molnár's basic plotline for Liliom and Julie is largely adhered to, as is much of his dialogue (although Hammerstein makes it more colloquial and gives it a New England flavor). Billy Bigelow is a womanizer and an abusive husband, as is Liliom in the non-musical play, however, both the Molnar play and the Rodgers and Hammerstein musicalization are careful to stress that he has hit Julie only once, and that other characters erroneously believe that he is a habitual wife-beater.

Carousel also retains the attempted robbery scene and Liliom/Billy Bigelow's suicide early in the second act.

In December 2011, a ballet adaptation of Liliom, with music by Oscar-winning composer Michel Legrand, was premiered by the Hamburg Ballet, and starred Alina Cojocaru as Julie. In this version, Liliom's child is changed from being a girl to a boy (Louis instead of Luisa or Louise).