July 19, 2006
OUDS’s summer tour of Congreve’s 1700 tragicomedy plays this week in the cathedral garden at Christ Church. Watching a naturalistic play in a garden setting is a strange experience compared to watching a magical Shakespeare number, or something Greek and portentous. This is evinced early on when the play’s actual and supposed villains spend a number of minutes playing cards silently in front of the audience who, in turn, sit wondering if they’re allowed to finish their conversations. There is something so English about the venue, and likewise so English about this discomfort, that it truly serves to bring down the fourth wall, in the way that the raucous playhouses of the restoration might have managed with their audience participation and games of chance in the royal box.
The world, whose way this is, is one of widows, fops and intrigue. Congreve wrote the play in response to a 1698 pamphlet attacking the morals of the theatre and calling for its destruction, coming down most strongly of all on Congreve and his fellow writers Vanburgh and Dryden. The play’s verbal dexterity and seering, cross-cutting, wit are always in danger of being lost on a modern audience, and of having their meaning sacrificed by actors who put their all into getting out their lines, but much of that fault surely belongs to Congreve, who was damned by Dryden’s faint praise when he wrote that the original production ‘deserved more success’, and not to this company, despite some of the dialogue occasionally being played to the trees or the garden walls rather than to the audience.
The central quartet of Mr and Mrs Fainall, Mirabell and Mrs Marwood are more than convincing in their intrigues. Sarah Cook’s Marwood deserves singling-out for her rich voice, and expressive physical acting, and Amy Tatton-Brown as Mrs Fainall serenely manages to bring life to Congreve’s presiding angel. As the half-brothers Witwoud and Sir Wilful, Adam Perchard and Andy Erskine are outstanding. Perchard’s characterization of the fop Witwoud is visceral and fills the garden with his powdered presence; his singing is the evening’s high-point. As the Shropshire squire Sir Wilfull, Erskine’s yokel accent is constant, and at no time leads to an obscuring of meaning, truly a masterstroke for regional speech in a student production.
The decision to play Lady Wishfort as an aged and pettish little girl lost, rather than bitter and washed-up cannot be underpraised. In this characterization, the play is given a lift for those who might be put off by Congreve’s dark portrayal of the matriarch. Georgina Osborne plays the role with great comic aplomb, especially when called upon to chastise her erring maidservant, Foible, with a besom. As Foible, Isabel Stowell-Kaplan too deserves mention, managing to bring-out the character’s sweetness despite the challenge of filling an outdoor space with a modest voice.
With some very strong performances, the periwigs of the gentlemen and the lace-edged gowns of the ladies make a refreshing change in garden theatre from fairies and spells.
The world, whose way this is, is one of widows, fops and intrigue. Congreve wrote the play in response to a 1698 pamphlet attacking the morals of the theatre and calling for its destruction, coming down most strongly of all on Congreve and his fellow writers Vanburgh and Dryden. The play’s verbal dexterity and seering, cross-cutting, wit are always in danger of being lost on a modern audience, and of having their meaning sacrificed by actors who put their all into getting out their lines, but much of that fault surely belongs to Congreve, who was damned by Dryden’s faint praise when he wrote that the original production ‘deserved more success’, and not to this company, despite some of the dialogue occasionally being played to the trees or the garden walls rather than to the audience.
The central quartet of Mr and Mrs Fainall, Mirabell and Mrs Marwood are more than convincing in their intrigues. Sarah Cook’s Marwood deserves singling-out for her rich voice, and expressive physical acting, and Amy Tatton-Brown as Mrs Fainall serenely manages to bring life to Congreve’s presiding angel. As the half-brothers Witwoud and Sir Wilful, Adam Perchard and Andy Erskine are outstanding. Perchard’s characterization of the fop Witwoud is visceral and fills the garden with his powdered presence; his singing is the evening’s high-point. As the Shropshire squire Sir Wilfull, Erskine’s yokel accent is constant, and at no time leads to an obscuring of meaning, truly a masterstroke for regional speech in a student production.
The decision to play Lady Wishfort as an aged and pettish little girl lost, rather than bitter and washed-up cannot be underpraised. In this characterization, the play is given a lift for those who might be put off by Congreve’s dark portrayal of the matriarch. Georgina Osborne plays the role with great comic aplomb, especially when called upon to chastise her erring maidservant, Foible, with a besom. As Foible, Isabel Stowell-Kaplan too deserves mention, managing to bring-out the character’s sweetness despite the challenge of filling an outdoor space with a modest voice.
With some very strong performances, the periwigs of the gentlemen and the lace-edged gowns of the ladies make a refreshing change in garden theatre from fairies and spells.