A staggering clinical experiment, in which English Psychologist K. O. Newman acted as his own guinea pig, is recorded in Two Hundred and Fifty Times I Saw a Play (Pelagos Press, Oxford; $1). Moreover, Newman saw the playTerence Rattigan's Flare Pathat successive performances, always sitting in the same third-row aisle seat.
Newman's reason was "to find out things never noticed before"; his reaction, "truly incredible boredom." The most trying period was "the latter half of the first 25 performances. Then I got my second wind." Newman learned to sleep open-eyed, but the slightest deviation from the script would wake him up "with...
To continue reading:
or
Log-In
