- OTHER MEDIA
|
- SF Bay Guardian March 21, 2007 (Robert Avila)
-
- Lauren Wilson's able comedy, a farcical take on Robert Louis Stevenson,
is a sort of Heckle and Jekyll and Hyde with a touch of Grand Guignol.
Set in the posh environs of a cash-strapped aristocratic family headed
by an oblivious matriarch (a delightfully cross-dressing Andrew Calabrese),
the play revolves around son Henry. Played by a smooth Gabriel Diamond,
Henry is too busy experimenting with a potion capable of unraveling the
tangle of good and evil in every human soul to pay much attention to the
matchmaking scheme of his sister (Erin Carter) to pair him with the young
and rich Dewthistle (Hannah Knapp). Instead, the somewhat Higgins-like
Henry, assisted by simpleminded cousin Xavier (Ben Dziuba), fixates on
extracting a bit of blood from the evil half of a set of twins (a double
pleasure played by Elizabeth Bullard), daughters of the redoubtable Lady
Throckmortonshire (a very funny Christian Cagigal). The generally amusing
script flags at points and some of the slapstick appears a little cramped
on the Exit stage, but more than once director Matthew Graham Smith, a
Dell'Arte Company core member, and his sharp cast mix some potent concoctions
of their own, such as the smart move of putting some action both above
and below the banquet table.
|
|