The final three productions
of the Shaw Festival’s 2002 season are impressive indeed. The world premiere of
Simon Bradbury’s Chaplin, though,
looks more like a brilliant work in progress than the final solution to the
problem of Charlie Chaplin’s tramp having to deal with Hitler.
           Christopher Newton’s choice for his final directing stint
before retiring as Artistic Director is Noel Coward’s Hay Fever. Both as director and actor,
Newton has displayed an elegant bent toward stylish, witty comedy —
especially Coward’s. And Hay
Fever, requiring delicate interplay between
polished mannerism and clowning idiosyncrasy, is exactly Newton’s cup of tea.
He even manages a suggestion of some substance in this silly farce masquerading
as a comedy of manners.
           Hay Fever takes us to the country home of the insufferably
liberated, grandstanding Bliss family. The mother, Judith Bliss, is a recently
retired grande dame of the theater; she’d like to return to the stage, but
plays out scenes of her former triumphs constantly enough to seem not to have
left.
           Her husband, David, writes successful novels at home and
subjects his family to readings from his manuscripts. Her son, Simon, is an
artist who displays his paintings mostly at home to family and guests. Sorel,
the daughter, is sometimes an aspiring actress, sometimes an aspirant to
“normal” artless life.
           They all rapaciously use attractive acquaintances as sex
objects — though they probably never actually complete a sex act with their
playthings.
           We see a cozy weekend at home with the Blisses: Each has
invited an attractive guest without telling the others. Their only servant,
Judith’s former dresser, Clara, has remarked that there’s little to eat in the
house and too much for her to do; so you can imagine her reaction when she’s
told that there will be eight for dinner. The guests are amusingly unprepared
for the Bliss family hijinks, and have such a miserable time that they
predictably sneak out for a finale almost exactly like that of Coward’s Private Lives.
           With the aid of Alan Brodie’s
almost choreographed lighting, William Schmuck’s wonderfully revealing set
opens doors and windows to keep developing the comedy. A masterful cast of
topnotch Shaw Festival actors play the piece for utmost comic effect. And
especially Fiona Reid as Judith gives a star-turn performance that’s a work of
art. Her take on seeing husband David grappling with a woman on the rug below
as Judith descends the stairway should be filmed and archived for studies in
physical comedy.
Another piece of
inspired claptrap, J. M. Barrie’s
sentimental The Old Lady Shows Her Medals, sounds like perfect lunchtime
theater entertainment.
           It’s a patriotic character piece about a lonely old
woman’s pretense that she has a son in the war, which comes to unlikely factual
truth when she meets the lonely young soldier whose name she has appropriated
as that of her son.
           Directed with extraordinary sensitivity and creative
physical expression by Todd Hammond, this lunchtime production boasts perfectly
chosen designs by Deeter Schurig, a sterling supporting cast, and two leads who
would be very difficult to improve upon. Jennifer Phipps gives her most
controlled, authentic performance of a long, distinguished career as the Old
Lady, and Pete Treadwell matches her with a heartbreakingly understated,
realistic but beautifully theatrically built portrayal of the young Scots
soldier.
           I was
expecting a satisfyingly weepy good time. What I got was a truly rewarding
experience — a small-scale but overwhelming example of a great world theater
company.
Chaplin(The Trial of Charles
Spencer Chaplin, Esq.) not only demonstrates Simon Bradbury’s talent and
interesting ideas as a writer, but also shows us how very well he can move in
this bravura one-man show.
           Coached by
movement and Chaplin expert Dan Kamin, who trained Robert Downey Jr. to move
like Chaplin in the 1992 movie Chaplin,
Bradbury gives a virtuoso performance, though he doesn’t move as well as
Downey.
           Bradbury
creates very persuasively distinctive personas for Chaplin’s tramp, Chaplin’s
Hynkel, the dictator based on Hitler, and the distraught Charles Chaplin, who
is under political attack and beginning to doubt the continuing viability of
his famous tramp character. The film he is making in this drama, The Great Dictator, was, in fact the
last Chaplin film using that tramp character.
           But showy
though all this theatrical invention is, including multi-media tricks and much
funny slapstick, the overall play relies far too much on assumed knowledge of
what happened to Chaplin, who his co-workers were, and what goes on in the
film, The Great Dictator. It doesn’t
share enough. The program notes do, but not the play.
           Is Chaplin in his studio rehearsing or creating Hynkel’s
famous ballet bouncing a giant balloon of the globe? How much of the film is
completed at this point? And why all the new music by Paul Sportelli in the
manner of Chaplin instead of Chaplin’s music?
           The play ends with what seems to be the triumph of Hitler
in the guise of Hynkel, unless you know that the tramp character’s barber
pretends to be the “Great Dictator” and delivers the film’s climactic speech.
           And the many politically satirical verbal jokes and puns
of the film are just dropped into dialogue, incomprehensibly to anyone not
familiar with the film, rather than presented so that the audience can
understand and laugh at the satire.
           Ultimately, I thought the script overlong, repetitious,
and, in spots, incoherent. It’s a fascinating effort, but it needs work.
Shaw Festival: Noel Coward’s Hay Fever at the
Festival Theatre to November 24; at the Royal George Theatre;J. M. Barrie’s The Old Lady Shows Her Medals noonat the Royal George Theatre to September 21; Simon Bradbury’s Chaplin at the Court House Theatre to
September 22. www.shawfest.simpatico.ca; 1-800-511-SHAW.
This article appears in Aug 21-27, 2002.
