SITE GUIDE
SEARCH
REVIEWS
REVIEW ARCHIVES
ADVERTISING AT CURTAINUP
FEATURES
NEWS
Etcetera and
Short Term Listings
LISTINGS
Broadway
Off-Broadway
NYC Restaurants
BOOKS and CDs
OTHER PLACES
Berkshires
London
California
New Jersey
DC
Philadelphia
Elsewhere
QUOTES
TKTS
PLAYWRIGHTS' ALBUMS
LETTERS TO EDITOR
FILM
LINKS
MISCELLANEOUS
Free Updates
Masthead
A CurtainUp Review
To Fool the Eye
|
"This place is completely frozen in the three days of that summer.
"—Hotel Cafe Proprietor
|
Maureen Torsney-Weir, Amanda Holston
(Photo credit: Mark Garvin) |
To Fool the Eye has admirable qualities, but the comedy doesn't hold up, partly because of Hatcher's adaptation choices and partly due to elements of director Jennifer Childs' production. This comedy may be droll, but mostly the audience isn't laughing.
A crisp Maureen Torsney-Weir as the doughty duchess sets the tone and spirit of the play. However, Mr. Hatcher's adaptation could have made the point that she is comically long-winded without actually bogging down the performance to demonstrate it. Although this able actress does as well as anyone possibly could with the script, the playwright could have perked up flagging interest and lost half an hour by carving out the fat around her precious amusing nuggets.
David Howey, himself an older man, does good Old Men. Unencumbered by scripted verbosity, his characters' demeanor and expressions steal scenes.
Among the shows high points is the ensemble, which has the timing down flat. A marvelously overbearing head butler (Brian McCann), commands a comic line of waiters and also sharply orchestrates the show's transitions. The assemblage of characters in the second act's key gypsy cafe scene, choreographed by Dave Jadico, are fascinating to watch and hear as they hang about, dance, and make impromptu music with tableware. Spirited musicians playing Christopher Colucci's original gypsy music provide ambiance.
The cafe scene is not without issues, however, as it carries the melodramatic message and deconstructs the Prince's great loss, exposing it as basically silly. Michael Doherty, suitably depressed as Prince Albert, swings from miserable to melancholy and back, and finally emerges from his gloom. Lovely Amanda Holston, bright but well under-nuanced as the forthright mademoiselle Amanda, lacks definition in her role as the replacement Leocadia.
Burdened by the Prince's lengthy speeches and the mademoiselle's repetitions, the café scene, like the first act, would benefit from the sacrifice of half an hour's talk. Of course the sage advice, "Brevity is the soul of wit" is too late here, and anyway it was originally uttered by Polonius, a character not known for being succinct.
Adam Riggar's cute and charming faux French scenic design (beautifully lighted by Shelley Hicklin) briefly employs trompe l'oeil with live persons peering from within the frames of portraits. However, the wonderful set has a liability: The frankly fake look of a managed reality, although consistent with the play's theme, forces the activity onto a narrow plane inside a large proscenium picture frame. While the flat surface carries the concept, it denies the capacity to provide enough spatial depth to support oblique movement and potentially more interest-worthy fluid action, especially throughout the first act.
It's important that To Fool the Eve achieves an interesting interplay of the 'real' with the constructed, pretend reality, and with memory. But as the different levels converge, the so-called real stuff doesn't come off particularly realistic, and as far as the fake stuff goes, it's not an easy task to present deliberate artifice and avoid coming across as too artificial to maintain interest.
Despite Torsney-Weir's way with a phrase and Howey's way with old men; despite the lively ensemble, pretty sets, costumes, and well played music, this soufflé, sagging from excess starch and fat, falls a bit flat.
|
To Fool the Eye
Adaptation of Anouilh's Leocadia by Jeffrey Hatcher Translated by Stephanie Debner Directed by Jennifer Childs Cast: Amanda Holston, Maureen Torsney-Weir, David Howey, Michael Doherty, Brian McCann, David Blatt; Dana Marcus, Bianca Vasaturo. Ensemble: Allison Brobst, Alex Cummiskey, Vincent Giannone, Paul Holleger, Todd Hullfish, Eric Martin, Samantha Wend Set Design: Adam Riggar Lighting Design: Shelley Hicklin Sound Design & original music: Christopher Colucci Costume Design: Alisa Sickora-Kleckner Feb 14- Mar 3, 2013. 1812 Productions, the only professional U.S. theater company dedicated exclusively to comedy, is in residence at Drexel University's Mandell Theater. Reviewed by Kathryn Osenlund based on 02/23 performance at Mandell Theater, Drexel University |
|
REVIEW FEEDBACK Highlight one of the responses below and click "copy" or"CTRL+C"
Paste the highlighted text into the subject line (CTRL+ V): Feel free to add detailed comments in the body of the email. . .also the names and emails of any friends to whom you'd like us to forward a copy of this review. Visit Curtainup's Blog Annex For a feed to reviews and features as they are posted add http://curtainupnewlinks.blogspot.com to your reader Curtainup at Facebook . . . Curtainup at Twitter Subscribe to our FREE email updates: E-mail: esommer@curtainup.comesommer@curtainup.com put SUBSCRIBE CURTAINUP EMAIL UPDATE in the subject line and your full name and email address in the body of the message. If you can spare a minute, tell us how you came to CurtainUp and from what part of the country. |
Slings & Arrows- view 1st episode free
Anything Goes Cast RecordingOur review of the show
Book of Mormon -CDOur review of the show
