Desire Under the Elms

When Ephraim Cabot brings his young bride Abbie home to their remote New England farm, he little foresees the turmoil that her arrival will bring his family. Ephraim’s youngest son at first loathes the newcomer, but when hatred gives way to lust, the resulting conflict threatens to rock the peaceful farm to its core.

Eugene O’Neill imagined Desire Under the Elms in its entirety one night as he slept, and the play has the passion and intensity of a fever dream. First produced in 1924, this twentieth-century American classic has the power and scope of ancient Greek drama, infused with O’Neill’s ravishing vision of rural life.