The Screwtape Letters, a novel of C. S. Lewis, is both satirical and instructional, maybe at once the funniest of Lewis' works and also the most trenchant. It has converted people, and amused many more. How many works of theological interest can say as much? (Just now I can't think of any). Published during World War II, Screwtape seems to remain fresh and accessible--and every few years its schema is reused for some other purpose, the sincerest form of flattery, as they say.
Screwtape seems like a natural for stage adaptation and has been performed by several writer/producers/actors before Max McLean. But it is McLean who has excelled. He presently has a bravura, small cast performance at the Westside Theater Off-Broadway in New York. The production has been favorably noticed in the World and The Wall Street Journal ("One hell of a good show"), among other places. But I particularly enjoyed a recent sizable back-story treatment by Retta Blaney in the estimable high church Anglican (Episcopal) journal, The Living Church (July 25 issue).
For what is worth, my opinion is that Screwtape would make an outstanding film and gain millions of new fans where it now wins thousands. The letters from the minor devil, Screwtape, to his agent, Toadpipe, are an indirect means to describe for us sympathetically and humorously the devil's "patient", a young man whose soul Screwtape intends to corrupt. It could be entertaining to follow the patient on the big screen.
There are at least two or three friendly film makers who should be looking at the possibility.
McLean, who himself plays Screwtape on stage--in a gaudy gold and red brocade smoking jacket--says his greatest difficulty was getting Lewis' long sentences into script bites that won't gag an actor on stage. He seems to have pulled it off and also to have reduced what would have been several hours of drama into a lively 90 minutes. "We have twice as much content as most shows and we're half as long," he says. "I feel audiences want to delve into the meatiness of the piece."
The play has been extended in New York into October. I am going to try to see it before then, but if I (and you) can't, McLean will have another national road show this winter (he's had at least one before the New York opening). Then maybe a movie?
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