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A CurtainUp New Jersey Review
The Learned Ladies
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I like a woman who keeps her studies secret — Clitandre
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L to R Alison Weller, Marion Adler Susan Maris (Photo: Jerry Dalia)
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Despite Moliere writing it even as he was losing a battle with tuberculosis, it is a happy lark of a play — an almost giddy satire that continues Moliere's genteel attacks on the narrow-minded and the phony. Using Richard Wilbur's admired and generally sparkling translation, director Brian B. Crowe has happily given his company of expert farceurs every opportunity to take advantage of all the outrageous excesses and exuberant flourishes that this playful play of manners provide.
Although The Learned Ladies remains no less than the typically amusing lesson in common sense we expect and no more that the gentle skewing of pretensions we admire, this production has as its primary supplement a host of definitively shaped comical performances. Each is , so deft and daft in conception. Just as the "Ladies" are embroiled in the follies of irrational behavior, we are entertained by the versifying of both sexes.
We have for our constant amusement a household swooning in rhymed couplets over classical Greek literature, science, art, and poetry and, in one case, men on the moon. Scenic designer Charlie Calvert has given the company the gracious semblance of a 17th century home in which to cavort. The all white and gold decor and set upon an oval shaped stage is imaginatively supported by a foundation of over-sized (make that gigantic) books.
Costume designer Paul H. Canada has dressed the ladies, learned or otherwise, in soft pastels and some frocks purposely enhanced with very funny whimsical touches. You can't help but laugh aloud as you begin to notice the crafty miniatures (a globe of the world and a set of books) that crown their white bouffant wigs that for the most part resemble the derrieres of lambs before sheering.
Forgiving the play's potential to irk some of our more humorless and rigid post-17th century feminists with its theme "learning can make great fools," the title characters are all seen as utterly foolish purveyors of highfalutin talk. The machinations of matchmaking get the play going when Philaminte, the wife of the easy-going (hen-pecked???) Chrysale, selects Trissotin, an indisputably worthless (repulsive ???) poet and her personal mentor, as the most likely husband for her daughter Henriette. Henriette is, wouldn't you know, in love with Clitandre — a nice young man who had previously wooed Armande, her now jealous but "learned" sister. Into the mix comes the sister's Aunt Belise, a woman whose lofty intellectual pursuits will not be compromised by her deluded notion that every man she knows has the hots for her.
Of the more outstanding turns, I enjoyed John Hickok, as Chrysale, whose meekness is charged by his ever growing sparks of exasperation ("Is thinking all this household thinks about?"). Alison Weller gets some of the biggest laughs as the aunt who believes every man "worships me inwardly."
Susan Maris elicits our sympathy as Armande, the older sister who is, we may assume, married to philosophy. Marion Adler demands and gets the comical spotlight as Philaminte, the shrewish wife "charmed by pedantry." Rachel Fox, as Henriette, is appropriately charming and demure. No one will deny Maurice Jones his straight and unaffected posturing as Clitandre, Henriette's suitor who steadfastly backs up his early declaration"I have a body and a spirit."
"Domestic servants, it's a losing game," frets the convincing Christine Sanders as the frazzled Martine, the kitchen maid who has been fired because she cannot learn the rules of proper speech, and who when she is re-hired at the end of the play, defends a woman's right to be unlearned if she chooses. While Moliere could not suspect that the rhythm of his play would ever be disrupted by the roar of overhead airplanes, he would have approved a company that was prepared when it happened to go directly into a sprightly Minuet ("flying machine interval" said the banner that was carried three times across the stage by servants) during the splendid performance I attended.
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The Learned Ladies by Moliere Directed by Brian B. Crowe Cast: Susan Maris (Armande), Rachael Fox (Henriette), Maurice Jones (Clitandre), Alison Weller (Belise), Lindsay Smiling (Arise), John Hickok (Chrysale, Vadius), Christine Sanders (Martine), Marion Adler (Philaminte), Clark Scott Carmichael (Trissotin), Felix Mayes (Lepine, Notary), George Labusohn, Tim Liu, Jordan Parasynchuk-Buhat (Footmen), Lizzie Docel, Courtneyu McGowan, Marisa Tegeda (Chambermaids). Scenic Designer: Charlie Calvert Costume Designer: Paul H Canada Lighting Designer: Hamilton E.S. Smith Sound Designer: Brian B. Crowe Rehearsal Stage Manager: Denise Cardarelli Production Stage Manager: Christine Whalen Running time: 2 hours including intermission The Shakespeare Theatre of New Jersey on the Outdoor Stage on the campus of the College of St. Elizabeth, Morris Township, NJ. (973) 408 - 5600 Tickets: $35.00; $15 for students Performances: Tuesday through Saturdays at 8 pm; Sundays at 7:30 pm and a special twilight performance on Saturdays at 4:30 pm. From 06/18/14 Opened 06/26/14 Ends 07/27/14 Review by Simon Saltzman based on performance 07/26/14 |
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