Opening Scene of Educating Rita Essay -- Educating Rita Themes Charact

Opening Scene of Educating RitaExplore the ways in which Russell engages the audiences interest inthe main characters and themes in the opening scene of Educating Ritaand explain whether you judge the play written in 1979 is still applicable to 2005.Willy Russells play, Educating Rita, written in 1979, is a storyabout a typical lower sort out woman called Rita who decides she wants to expire an educated life and she tries to do this by getting a private nurture called Frank to teach her, but learning to lead an educatedlife proves to be not what she involveed.Willy Russell introduces Frank and Rita in two very different ways.Frank is introduced as a well read university tutor who seems to likehis drink this is shown when Russell writes the walls argon lined withbooks making him appear educated. But then writes pulls out a pileof books to reveal a bottle of whisky which makes the audiencequestion their first impression of him as a typical universityteacher, is he an alchoholic? Doe s he drink too much? Is thisimportant?Rita is introduced as an uneducated, loud, cruel young woman. The firstimpression Russell gives the audience is Rita saying Im comin in,arent I? to someone she has never met before, which shows a lack ofmanners or simply a casual upbringing. He then shows her going to achair and dumping her bag. By using the verb dump Russellimmediately suggests that Rita is not a ladylike person, and thisfollows the impression that she is ill mannered.Russell presents the play as a two-hander so that the audience isfocused on the clash between Frank and Rita and the sinless play isfocused on Frank and Ritas point of view. The two very contrastingpersonalities seem t... ... or missingsomething in his life, and Rita also says I want to be free whichmeans she feels trapped in her life and wants to escape and she wantsto do this by getting educated. They both seem to change by dint of theplay almost into totally different people, Rita changes her name tosusan as she thinks it sounds proper. The play has a certain humourabout it as the two characters personalities and views are almostopposite, this creates chaos, as neither of them knows what the otheris talking about which is amusing to the audience, and Rita is veryloud and uses a lot of swearing and slang which is not what you wouldexpect in a university. In conclusion, Russell uses the contrastof the two characters in Educating Rita to create humour and engagethe audience, whilst facing issues and views that are still a problemand relevant to today in 2005.