Word: beckets
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Specifically, Eliot shows the struggle of Archbishop Thomas a Becket to achieve the purification necessary for martyrdom, and the effect of his death on the people of Canterbury. But Thomas' martyrdom is to have universal meaning. For this reason, Becket and every person in the play, seem intentionally pale and undefined. Eliot champions a stylized drama in which the playwright, not the actor or director, is responsible for every nuance and subtlety of meaning. Particularly in "Murder in the Cathedral," there is little room for individual interpretation. A slight tendency to overact can damage the effect produced by the play...
Thomas Gaydos is largely, successful in the part. With his full and well-modulated voice he can put across the long sermon between acts which might easily have been dull. And Gaydos' Becket is always a mature, gentle figure. Except at the very end, however, he lacks the fullness of power that Thomas must also have throughout. For "Murder in the Cathedral" is not a play of growth. Thomas does not suddenly seize on the power which he takes to his death. He had it, Eliot explains, over since he resigned the Chancellorship to devote his whole being...
...comment were those who played both the four temptors in the first act and the murdering knights in the second. Robert Schwarz's straightforward earnestness as the temptor who offered Thomas the greatest gift of all--martyrdom--is skillfully handled, while Andre Gregory is delightfully whimsical as he offers Becket the joys of past dissipations. As the two temptors who offer various forms of temporal power, Louis Begley and John Docker are only fair. Begley over-acts to the point of appearing a scheming spy, and Docker's offer of a coalition between bishop and barons seems too gruff...
...real drama in "Murder in the Cathedral" is in the speeches of the chorus. Their fear of harm for Becket, their terror at his death, and the exultation that comes with their final recognition of his spiritual triumph, are expressed in some of the most beautiful poetry Eliot has written. The dramatic impact of the passage from doubt to certainty is tremendous...
This verse play centers around the murder of Becket and the spiritual crises which he went through before his death...