When we talked to patrons about producing Little Women the opera many of them told very personal stories about how much reading the book meant to them when they were girls.
The August 27th edition of The New Yorker magazine article “How ‘Little Women’ Got Big”, confirmed that Little Women was an inspiration to many women for generations and especially for writers from Simone de Beauvoir to Stephenie Meyer. “It is doubtful whether any novel has been more important to America’s female writers than Louisa May Alcott’s ‘Little Women'”.
Though many of Island City Opera’s patrons have cherished memories of Little Women, more recent generations seem to have lost touch with this American classic. But, no sooner has a generation forgotten a great novel than Hollywood steps in to remind us and perhaps show how the work is still relevant.
And so, the 2018 remake of Little Women – you can see the move trailer here.
Not that this is the first time Little Women has hit the screen. There have been at least two silent movies, a 1933 version starring an unknown Katharine Hepburn, a 1949 version and a 1994 version with Winona Ryder as Jo. In 1987 there was a 48 episode anime version in Japan.
We thought since the book has been such a cherished memory, we would find one of the many book cover illustration as our production image. We are using the illustration by Jessie Willcox Smith. Born in 1863, in Philadelphia, she was considered one of the greatest pure illustrators during the Golden Age of American Illustration.
