Reviews
Conjunction Junction
By James Yeara
Or, by Liz Duffy Adams, directed by Jeffrey Mousseau
StageWorks/Hudson, through July 4
Quickly paced, and engagingly performed, the regional premiere of Liz Duffy Adams’ Or, at StageWorks/Hudson is a fascinating fluff of a play. Or, Adams’ theme tickles the intellect, the performances boggle the funny bone, and the lines mesmerize the ears with their rhymed couplets, ornate conceits, and titillating prurience. Or, StageWorks/Hudson’s first show of the summer season is “a hit, a hit, a very palpable hit,” to borrow from what’shisname.
Set in the late 1660s during the restoration of the British monarchy under that randy dandy, Charles II (Jason Schuchman as the first of his broad and lively characters), Or, centers on the travails, tribulations, and titillations of real-life, Restoration-era, bisexual female playwright and spy for the monarchy, Aphra Behn (Angela Rauscher at her animated and bosom-heaving best). Seen first in a dingy dungeon for debtors (the excellent set by scenic designer Sarah Edkins is like an Edward Gorey ink drawing), Behn uses her wiles, feminine and otherwise, to free herself from the advances of her horny gaoler (Abby Lee in the first of her broadly horny roles) so that she can succumb to the advances of the disguised Charles II.
Behn’s subsequent tales of seduction, submission, spying, and lying unfurl with enough changing and shedding of costumes to make a runway model sigh or a nun blush. The main scene in this 90-minute play (without intermission) takes place in “the upstairs parlor” of a fashionable boarding house with a unseen boudoir offstage right and a large-enough-to-hide-a-man wardrobe stage left, both utilized to full farcical door-slamming effect.
Behn’s bi-obsessions soon unfold: sex and playwriting. Into her room the women and men come and go (often literally and quickly), talking in verse and prose high and low: “I thought I was the stairs to fucking Mount Olympus” pants famed Restoration actress and paramour Nell Gwynne (Abby Lee in the second of her broadly horny characters, though this time with a gamine allure and randy wit). The historical Gwynne was a favorite actress of Behn, John Dryden and other leading Restoration playwrights—as well as a celebrated whore. When surrounded by an angry mob who thought her Charles II’s Catholic mistress, Nell reportedly replied with a smile, “You are mistaken good people, I am the king’s Protestant whore.” In Or, both Behn and Nell muse on the use of sex: “I’m a whore,” Nell declares, to which Behn replies, “To be a woman is to be a whore,” adding after a second’s consideration, “Come to think of it, men are whores, too. . . . Men are cock-sucking whores to get ahead.”
That Behn frequently retreats to the writing desk right outside her frequently employed boudoir makes the mutual inspiration clear: Sex and writing are as tightly entwined as Charles and Behn, Behn and Nell, Nell and Charles, and Nell, Charles, and Behn are. This underscores both the fun of Or, and its weakness.
While you can listen to The Beatles’ “Two of Us” or The Turtles’ “Happy Together” or any of the other 1960s songs as underscore, Or, labors to make the connection between the “golden age” of sexual liberation in the 1660s and the “golden age” of sexual liberation in the 1960s. The text is clunky with effort to heave those decades together. Or, simply needs to enjoy the rompings of king, actress, and playwright. “I never know how to stop loving” Behn confesses, “I only know how to not let it stop me.” The first of three mainstage productions by female playwrights this summer at StageWorks/Hudson, Or, is an auspicious beginning, or, as Nell says, “sounds fucking fabulous, babe.”
Stageworks production of ‘Or,’ is a treat
By Charles Kondek
I've said it before, as have countless others, but I'll say it again: Stageworks Hudson is, if not the finest theater company in the area, it's pretty close to it. Every offering is a surprise, impeccably produced, brightly polished and of the highest professional caliber. So it now goes without saying that the opening of the current 2010 season, the regional premiere of “Or,” a play with a strange title (and unneeded comma) by Liz Duffy Adams, is the latest in a long line of exceptional, elevating and enlivening creativity. This is theater! It's what it's all about!
The title comes from the custom much in use during the Restoration (and prior) in England to have manuscripts with two titles, as in Shakespeare's “Twelfth-Night; or, What You Will,” John Dryden's “Secret Love; or, “The Maiden-Queen,” and, my
favorite title, “The Man of Mode; or, Sir Fopling Flutter,.” by Sir George Etherege.
Taking place in the first free-love era of 1660's, “Or,” centers around three historical people, author Aphra Behn, actress Nell Gwyn and King Charles II of England. Both women had a romantic attachment with Charles, and according to playwright Adams, with each other.
Aphra Amis Behn was perhaps the first professional female author in England, talking up writing after her merchant husband of three years died, and after spending time in debtor's prison and in Antwerp as a spy, sending political and naval information back to London. She wrote a number of coarse but popular Restoration plays: “The Forced Marriage” and “The Feigned Courtizans” are but two. She died in 1689 at 49 and is buried in Westminster Abbey.
Angela Rauscher gives a spirited, effortless performance as the wild, adventuress Behn. It is a neatly calibrated effort. And she does wonders with a mere raising of an eyebrow. A petite actress with a large talent.
Next in line, but by no means second, is Abby Lee as actress Eleanor Gwyn, known as Nell, a famous comedienne of her time, mostly in 'breeches parts'. She was notorious as the mistress of King Charles II and bore him at least one son, perhaps two. Lee, with her mischievous smile and saucy, naughty, twinkling eyes is delightful. It is difficult not to be taken in by her performance. Of course, strutting around the stage in tight-fitting, bright red hose, doesn't do her any harm. She is at one and the same time engagingly girlish and innocently boyish.
Both she and Rauscher are well matched, expertly feeding off one another, a lesson in collaborative performance practice, much like, say, a Beethoven violin/piano sonata. They give the work considerable lightheaded vitality as well as honest depth. Playwright Adams has been well served.
Completing and complementing the trio is Jason Schuchman as King Charles (and a few other characters). Schuchman has stature and poise and a comfortable regal bearing. He looks exactly like what and who he is supposed to be, and more than adequately holds up his side of the acting triangle. No mean feat up against the dynamic duo, Rauscher and Lee.
Author Liz Duffy Adams, a young but frequently produced playwright, is an inventive, accomplished writer, and for the most part her dialogue, much of it in verse, flows with a pleasing rhythm. She certainly has a feel for the language of the time, interspersing it with purposeful 1960's vernacular in a way that does not jar nor is in any form off-putting. And I would venture to say she really likes these characters.
The crisp and uncluttered direction is by Jeffrey Mousseau, repeating the fine work he did on “I Am My Own Wife” at Stageworks few years ago. The swift, non-stop pacing, the slamming of doors and hiding in cupboards and closets (in a clever line-drawing set by Sarah Edkins) and romping, scantily clad thespians more resembles a French farce than a Restoration comedy of manners, but who's complaining? It's still fun!
Artistic director and producer, Laura Margolis deserves a serious and prolonged round of applause. She continually offers proof that in precarious and in these now somewhat perilous times, supporting places like Stageworks/Hudson is a must, a duty. The production only runs through July 4. Hurry! For tickets: 518-822-9667.
Or, by Liz Duffy Adams.
Directed by Jeffrey Mousseau.
Reviewed by J. Peter Bergman
There is a great effect in good theater, not one that would seem great today in this era of electronic magic, but it is a pertinent and permanent traditional effect that isn’t seen often any longer: the passage of time is presented "avista" (within your sight) as lights slowly fade down, hold at a low point of illumination and then slowly come back up to a different look; night has passed and the dawn is upon you. It has never failed to work for me and the effect can be seen, right now, in Hudson, New York as Stageworks Hudson uses it in its season opener, "Or," a play about a playwright who works at her desk through the night rather than deal with her personal issues. Let us thank Frank Den Danto III for bringing us back to this theatrical reality. And for doing it so well.
As directed by Jeffrey Mousseau "Or," is the subtitle indication of a much larger play that we never get to see. The world picture is only marginally alluded to in this play. It moves us, instead, through the sordid private life of one-time spy, one-time married, part-time almost mistress, soon-to-be playwright Aphra Behn, the first woman in England to earn her living as a writer. It is 1668 and she is writing a play about... something we never hear about and living under the patronage of King Charles II. It is the Restoration and this new play is a Restoration comedy par excellence.
A three-hander with very talented actors in the small cast, this play is sometimes just plain funny as actors appear, disappear, bob up again in a different costume and even change their gender right before our eyes. In the only single role in the show, Angela Rauscher turns in an appealing character named Aphra Behn. Rauscher’s Aphra is much more open about her past than any Aphra before her has been. Whether or not Ms. Adams, the playwright, has had source material never seen before or not, she paints a full picture of the woman whose life remained a mystery to her contemporaries as well as to modern scholars. If she has done this from the creative center of her soul, then Brava! This is a job well done.
Rauscher is strong in the role, dominant and controlling. Her performance never accelerates into third gear, but it doesn’t have to do so even when third gear is holding sway over her stage buddies. Instead she maintains a neat cruising speed, only losing her grip momentarily when she kisses the king. Even her sexual escapades with Nell Gwynne seem more harmless fun than gender-bender option. The more manly aspects of her character are seen in subtle ways, usually, and the honesty in Aphra’s belief in her career future is entirely due to Rauscher’s fine performance.
Abby Lee plays Nell Gwynne, orange-vendor and actress, as well as Maria, the maid, the 1960's Prologue to the play and a Jailor. The relevance the author wants to get into this play with its "resonance to the 1960s" is made within the context of the piece and doesn’t really need the role of Prologue to do so. Adams needs to trust her material more. What she has written rings true for many of the 1960s crowd without the pointer and lesson at the outset.
Lee’s Gwynne, cross-dressed to look like a boy, is charming. Her freedom of movement and gesture is a delight, making Gwynne very much a living person and not a caricature. As Maria, she is heavy-duty comedy and a much needed relief from the will-she-won’t-she-is-she-isn’t-she sturm und drang of Nell Gwynne.
The funniest and most tiring roles are played by Jason Schuchman who dances around King Charles II, spy William Scott, and arts patron Lady Davenant. Sometimes Schuchman actually needs to be in two places at once and with the director’s superb help he manages it. This is a tricky acting assignment which he pulls off brilliantly. If there is true physical comedy in this play, it is contained within his performance. A ten-point out of ten possible for his Lady Davenant which he pulled off with aplomb. Wigs off to Schuchman! A good job.
Excellent production values are brought to the fore in Sarah Edkins excellent and theatrical set, Denise Massman’s fine costumes (with breakaway velcro connections I hope) and Den Danto’s lighting. Byron Nilsson’s sound work was just fine..
The story told in this play may or may not be true, but as an entertainment rather than a history lesson it is true to itself and its intent. Mousseau masters the quick-change comedy form and even if the product isn't deep and enlightening, it is historical and hysterical at the same time, a ninety minute one-act play that’s deserving of a second act, but there just isn’t one available. Pity. I could have used more of this sort of laughter on a hot summer night.
Or, plays at Stageworks Hudson, 41-A Cross Street, Hudson, NY, through July 4. For information and tickets call the box office at 518-822-9667 or check their website at www.stageworkshudson.org.
