The Theater: New Play in Manhattan, Nov. 19, 1956

Long Day's Journey into Night, Eugene O'Neill's unsparing levy on his own darkened past, may constitute his most substantial legacy to the American stage. Reaching Broadway 16 years after it was finished and three years after his death, this relentless chronicle of O'Neill's riven and tormented family has the imperious thrust of unblushing theater mated to unsoftened truth. It also achieves the illumination born of compulsive groping, prodding and clawing in dark places. In it O'Neill has managed to apply a famous phrase of Addison's—to ride in the whirlwind yet direct the storm....

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