The Van Hove version of Arthur Miller's THE CRUCIBLE

Ivo Van Hove likes to deconstruct texts onstage, putting his stamp on other people’s ideas.  This typically means that a 2-hour play will run 3 or even 4 hours because of the extra bulk.  The “stamps” don’t necessarily add anything, but may rather detract from the original piece.

For instance, in his current version of Arthur Miller’s The Crucible playing at the Walter Kerr Theatre, he adds “supernatural” effects.  If you know Mr. Miller’s play ,or American history, you know the girls in Salem never saw a witch or a spirit.  A group of adolescent girls in Salem were trying to get themselves out of trouble for getting caught dancing in the woods in the dead of night — dancing at any time was forbidden in their culture — by pointing accusatory fingers at others.  If you don’t immediately understand (and it was quite clear in this production) that the girls were lying, you must have nodded off halfway through the first act.  So when Mr. Van Hove adds interludes of a girl levitating and the wrath of God in the way of a lightning storm with high winds blowing singed paper into the schoolroom as if there’d been an explosion in the next county, he confuses the issue.  He creates a lie on top of the lie that does not help get the point across.  At least not the point of Arthur Miller’s play.  He gives an excuse to the adults who go along with the girls and their lies and the hell they create in Salem village.  And there is no excuse for the actions of the “righteous” adults in Salem in The Crucible.

First Van Hove brings the action forward to a more modern time.  The classroom the curtain rises on had a generic bland look, the hard chairs occupied by girls in their 'tweens and teens.  They wore conservative private school pleated skirts, knee-highs and white blouses.  Modern and neat.  The scene designed by Jan Versweyveld is open and light, with a large blackboard at the back of the stage covered in drawings and occasionally words.  The greatest flaw to this scenic design is its freedom.  There is no ceiling, and the walls reach out to the edges of the stage.  It’s wide open and bright.  Salem was neither bright nor open. Just as importantly, Mr. Van Hove’s loosey goosey staging uses all the corners of the set, so the audience sitting house left or right cannot see what goes on there.  I’ve written about this issue in the past, when directors ignore the audience viewpoint by staging action where only those who can afford front and center can see it.  This is the responsibility of the director along with his designer.  This problem would not have arisen had Mr. Van Hove 1) considered the claustrophobic society that trapped his characters and 2) walked the auditorium to see what parts of his staging needed to be adjusted to the theatre.  Not everyone sits orchestra center.

The action starts on that banal classroom disrupted, desks and chairs overturned — perhaps to give the actors something to do later.  Van Hove (with his costume designer Wojciech Dziedzic) makes the Reverend Parris look like a modern Jesuit in a sloppy sweater.  The adult women wear something like loose gaucho pants with baggy tops, the men somewhat deconstructed business suits.  Once the play begins, the girls’ white blouses come untucked.  Hardly fitting for an overly restrictive society.

Abigail vs. Mary in the foreground surrounded by, L  to R, Hathorne, Parris, Danforth, Proctor.
Photo Credit 2016 Sara Krulwich, NYTimes

Jason Butler Harner as Reverend Samuel Parris did fine work, showing us the preacher’s desires for monetary recompense and the respect he believes should come with his position, revealing him to be an articulate but weak man.  It is impossible to trust that he ever truly believed the girls, but maybe that’s as it should be.

Tina Benko does her job as Ann Putnam, but still doesn’t make that hard-hearted character come to life, any more than Thomas Jay Ryan does for her husband Thomas Putnam.  Brenda Wehle does not embody Rebecca Nurse when she enters, seeming to rely too much on her age to appear a village elder.  She does not reflect the strength of character Goody Nurse has that makes the whole village respect her.

Everything was rather dreary and stiff in not-old Salem with not-old-fashioned people speaking Mr. Miller’s lines intended for 17^th century characters, until Ben Whishaw entered the playing space.  He cast the perfectly competent Mr Harner into the shade.  Whishaw, while not physically imposing, took over the stage and the theatre, with his dark voice and straightforward talk.  He embodied John Proctor, the voice of reason from an imperfect man in a world gone mad.  For the rest of the play, we only wait for him to return to the stage.  He did have a rather unfortunate habit of jumping on people, which became distracting in his penultimate scenes.  I get it.  I just don’t think it worked.

The greatest disappointment of this production was Saoirse Ronan, whose film work I quite like.  As Abigail Williams, the teenaged seductress, she was shrill, stiff, “johnny one note” throughout.  She clearly had no vocal training or prior stage experience, which is unfortunate if her film experience led her to believe all would be fixed in the editing room.  It’s easy to see why the other girls fear her, hard to see why anyone would feel “softly” toward her.

As for the other girls:  Jenny Jules’ turn as Tituba, the Reverend Parris’ slave from Barbados, is grounded and appropriately amusing until threatened into submission. Elizabeth Teeter as Betty Parris has fine powers of concentration as she’s mauled about while “sleeping,” Ashlei Sharpe Chestnut as Susanna and Erin Wilhelmi as Mercy Lewis were barely noticeable.  Standout here was Tavi Gevinson as Mary Warren.  Initially Ms. Gevinson rather annoyed me as she seemed to be attempting to channel Scarlett Johansson.  By the second half, though, she’d gathered her strength and wits and did fine work as the torn participant in the travesty that was the Salem witch trials, suffering through her dilemma:  To be a part of the in crowd and do evil is one thing.  To step outside of that crowd and do good is dangerous. 

Elizabeth Teeter, Saoirse Ronan, and Tavi Gevinson

Jim Norton played the litigious Giles Corey with heart and humor.  It was easy to believe this man was a friend of many in his community, making that community’s betrayal and murder of him and his wife all the more appalling. 

The revered Reverend Hale entered Salem full of pomp and confidence and left broken.  His blind arrogance had a great deal to do with the growth of this ridiculous story told by guilty children into an all-consuming monster.  Bill Camp was competent enough in the role but neither deep nor varied. 

By the time we met Francis Church, his wife Rebecca was already falsely imprisoned so Ray Anthony Thomas had only the opportunity to plead for justice for his wife, his friends, and himself.  His performance was on the mark for the scene that leads its hearers to assume the play is really about the McCarthy hearings and naming names.  This is echoed at the end of the play by John Proctor when he retracts his false confession because his name is all he has left.  Nicely done, Mr. Miller and Mr. Thomas.

Sophie Okonedo was rather dull as Elizabeth Proctor offering us none of the character’s layers.  I expected more of Ms. Okonedo.

Ben Whishaw as John Proctor with Tavi Gevinson as Mary Warren, and Ciarán Hinds as Deputy Governor Danforth..

I looked forward to the entrance of Ciarán Hinds as Deputy Governor Danforth in the second act, and was not disappointed.  Mr. Hinds can command a stage and every other person on it as if he were born to that power.  His embodiment of Danforth assured us that the real Danforth is still burning in hell.  The only fault was that he seemed too intelligent to be so easily taken in by Abigail Williams, especially Ms. Ronan’s Abigail.

Teagle F. Bougere as Judge Hathorne postured and recited lines, as did Michael Braun as Ezekiel Cheever.  Those characters had beliefs and flaws, but these actors did not seem to know it.

Philip Glass music underscores the story, rarely overpowering it.  Favorite scene (that Mr. Miller did not write) gave us a wolf examining the stage.  A nifty scare.

Two final points about Mr. Van Hove’s direction.  First, the staging was clumsy, the playing space overlarge.  Bring the set in a little tighter or don’t stage scenes in the far corners.  Finally, I must wonder:  Are the dull performances of some of the secondary and tertiary characters the fault of the actors or the director?  Does Mr. Van Hove prefer the characters who are not primaries to fade into the background like chairs?  Does he not bother to work with those actors to develop their performances?  If all his focus was on Ms. Ronan, he surely failed.

Somehow despite the three hours it took Mr. Van Hove to tell this tale, his production did not tell the story of the play.  It is an important story and always relevant, and this lost opportunity is a shame.

In short, I prefer Mr. Miller’s version of his play to that of Mr. Van Hove.

~ Molly Matera, signing off to re-read a play I first read when I was 12 years old.  Full disclosure:  Decades ago, I played Abigail Williams in a touring production of the play with far fewer actors and a portable set.  It was one of the joys of my life as well as an extraordinary education. Maybe it’s better to not have as big a budget as Mr. Van Hove clearly had.  Kudos to the imaginative director of that past traveling production, Eric Hoffmann.  And R.I.P. to its fine Reverend Parris, the late Michael Graves.

A Little Shakespeare, Less Pinter

HAMLET at London’s National Theatre, broadcast live around the world and captured in Queens, NY, was thrilling.

While no dramaturg was listed in the program or online, he or she had a large influence on this production, since a great deal of editing was done on the script, scenes re-arranged, as well as interesting combined characters.  From the point of view of a filmed performance, I found only one flaw:  one or two too many close-ups in what was clearly a beautifully staged production by director Lyndsey Turner.  I want to see the actors in relation to one another and whatever was happening on the part of the stage the cameras weren’t showing me. 

But that’s minor.  What I did see was scintillating theatre with fine acting in a coherent production of a great play.  The dress is modern, the time not set, the formality of the address, and dress, and Elsinore itself tells us that this world is removed from ours no matter the year.

Will he or won't he?  Cumberbatch as Hamlet. (Photo Johan Persson)

The first scene on the ramparts was skipped and instead we are met by Benedict Cumberbatch’s Hamlet in front of the curtain, listening to a small phonograph play Nat King Cole’s rendition of “Nature Boy.”  Hamlet weeps.  Soon after Horatio enters, they jump ahead and right to the dinner scene, which is magnificently staged.  A long table is sumptuously set parallel to the edge of the stage so we can see everybody, and here begins a conceit through the play:   Hamlet comes forward (walking across the top of the table) and the action continues behind him silently, in slow motion, as Hamlet speaks directly to the audience.  

In this scene we meet the major players, including a Laertes who was clearly a friend of Hamlet’s, and who, loving his own father well, felt the sting of Claudius’ insensitive exhortations to Hamlet to forget his dead father.  No words are exchanged between them, yet a relationship is clear, as is the relationship established in the next scene with Laertes’ sister.

Kobna Holdbrook-Smith’s Laertes is not so self-absorbed here as he is often played, and is part of the court.  Siân Brooke’s Ophelia is young and in love, and the relationship between her and her brother Laertes is solidified when they sit at the grand piano stage center and play a little ditty together. This follows through later, when the piano, amid the shambles that Elsinore becomes in the second half, is out of tune and harsh.

Cumberbatch’s Hamlet is striking: he is in pain, he is in mourning. His mother Gertrude is oblivious to his pain and forgetful of her first husband since she’s so enamored of the second.  And yet we see this Gertrude, as played by Anastasia Hille, is connected to the people around her, Ophelia in particular.

Ciarán Hinds is a very good if cold Claudius.  I saw no passion for Gertrude, just affection.  He is a purely political animal.  Gertrude‘s path through the play is succinct — no dallying while her first husband was alive, this woman sees the truth only when Hamlet shows her, and finally sees Claudius for who he is. 

Hinds as Claudius in Elsinore as designed by Es Devlin.  (Photo Johan Persson)

When the Players present the play within the play, a small curtained stage is set up for the introduction of the Player King and Player Queen, then Hamlet, manic and sweating, plays Lucianus (nephew to Gonzago in the play within a play) himself. Later in his mother’s room, the same small curtained stage is used to hide Polonius behind the arras, which I found rather witty.

Karl Johnson was effective both as the Ghost of King Hamlet and the Gravedigger.  Morag Siller played a character comprised of Voltimand and Osric well, yet we miss the hilarity of a different sort of Osric.

Jim Norton as Polonius was fine without standing out from many an old man, his lines deeply edited. 

Some of the cuts were too deep, I think, but the actors made the most of them. Particular points for the work of the powerful Anastasia Hille and poignant Siân Brooke.

Act one ends with Claudius exhorting England to “Do it, England” meaning “the present death of Hamlet.”  Then an autumn wind blows across the stage….

Light and wind made for some very nice effects joining the end of the first act and the beginning of the second.  At the opening of the second half, detritus, dead leaves and dirt have been piled all over the stage, creating new levels of deterioration. 

When we see Ophelia in the first act, she carries about and uses a camera.  In the second act, she drags a trunk banging down the stairs.  Gertrude opens it when Ophelia exits and finds the trunk filled with torn black-and-white photographs and Ophelia’s camera. Seeing this, Gertrude knows what Ophelia is about and runs off after her, to no avail, of course.  In the second half, the women are a bit less well coiffed and dressed, in synch with the trappings of power that droop dwindling on the stage. 

Anastasia Hille as Gretrude.  (Photo by Johan  Persson)

After Ophelia’s death, director Lindsey Turner created a lovely stage picture of Claudius rushing after the enraged Laertes, stopping at the top of the stairs to reach back for his wife.  But Gertrude turns her back and walks away from him, barefoot through the dirt.  This Gertrude had not thought for a moment that her first husband died an unnatural death, but finally sees her nation crumbling around her and knows that something is rotten in the state of Denmark. 

In the second half, Hamlet’s cry from Ophelia’s grave to Laertes, “I loved you ever,” is a reinforcement of the friendship that appeared at that dinner table in the first half.  The fight scene is fabulous, beautifully staged by fight director Bret Yount and fought by highly skilled Hamlet and Laertes.  It brought about swift death.   

All in all an effective rendering, but close-cropped to focus on Hamlet and the nuclear family at the expense of some of other characters.  Although a slimmed down version of the play, this was a memorable Hamlet, produced by Sonia Friedman Productions.

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On the other hand, when it comes to the Roundabout Theatre Company production of Harold Pinter’s Old Times, I agree completely with my friend Horvendile’s blog about it at http://www.matthewslikelystory.blogspot.com/2015/10/old-times-or-you-pinter-you-brought-er.html.  At the end of the thankfully brief performance, the first thing out of my mouth was “I don’t think that’s what Pinter meant.”  That’s all.  It was a fun evening, but it wasn’t … Pinter.

Pinter is not about shouting and emoting; it’s about repressing.  The play is under and between the lines.  Pinter knew that shouting reduces the efficacy and impact of anger, diluting its power.  Pinter must be underplayed.  Director Douglas Hodge should know that, whatever his credentials.  Surely the three wonderful British actors (Kelly Reilly, Clive Owen, and Eve Best) must know that. 

L-R Reilly, Best, and Owen. (Photo: Joan Marcus)

As for the rest, the immediate assault by light (Japhy Weiderman) and sound (Clive Goodwin) started us off poorly.  The set design by Christine Jones was quirky and odd and I did wonder if it signified being at the edge of the world….perhaps a bit distracting.  While costumes by Constance Hoffman were fitting, music was ill-chosen by Thom Yorke.

This is not to say I’m not glad I saw it. I’m glad.  But it wasn’t ….  Pinter.

~ Molly Matera, signing off, recommending National Theatre’s HAMLET (still playing at select theatres, see http://ntlive.nationaltheatre.org.uk/) and not so much the Roundabout Old Times.

Ghosts and Ghouls in the Cold, Dark North

Ghost stories, on the printed page, on the silver screen, on the tube, I’ve always been drawn to them.  I developed a taste early for black-and-white horror films, from The Haunting to The House on Haunted Hill (the original, not the remake, in both cases). You may recall that I have issues with allegedly scary movies that aren’t. (A blog about less than scary stuff I've seen.) I tried again this weekend, viewing a period piece with cinematography that sometimes appeared almost black and white, but wasn’t — cinematographer Tim Maurice-Jones’ rich tones made the blacks blacker and the grays deeper, with some luscious browns in addition.  Visually, this ghost story was exactly as advertised.

Daniel Radcliffe as Arthur Kipps at the gates of the haunted house.

I’ve enjoyed the build-up and trailers to The Woman In Black.  And I’m rather surprised but happy to report I enjoyed the film as well.  This is an unambiguous ghost story, sure of itself. Its color scheme lends to a time when Nature ruled us and we had no inkling yet that we might try to rule Her.  Candles light houses, headlights are weak, and the amazing combustion engine is something that no one has had before to potentially uncover truths ― and skeletons ― in this mad haunting. 

Some thoughts:

First, adults are stupid.  That’s not about the movie, but I ask you, if you saw the advertisements for this film, where there’s a scary lady and a number of dead children, would you bring children?  A five year old?  The woman behind me brought a gaggle between five (at most) and nine.  These children may not have gotten this film while they watched it, snuffling and slurping and crunching and whispering that they had to pee.  But tonight, or tomorrow night, or the night after?  I predict there will be nightmares and the stupid adults won’t understand why. 

Second, this film is visually awesome, from the close-ups to the long shots, the darkness that is barely touched with light.  Shadows frighten even as they woo us toward their peculiarly warm depths.  Director James Watkins and cinematographer Maurice-Jones seduce us with a watercolor palette in a brightly lit opening scene of innocents at play.  Then the tones turn to moody oil paints. Kudos to set decoration by Niamh Coulter — the child’s nursery is the creepiest room I’ve ever seen.  All those Victorian wind-up toys and gewgaws may seem like mere clutter, but those bulging eyes engender dread and terror.  The Woman in Black has fabulous production design (Kave Quinn) and art direction (Paul Ghirardani), as well as brisk film editing (Jon Harris). 

Third, the premise works pretty well — most haunted house stories start off at a disadvantage with a ridiculous reason given for staying in the psychologically and physically threatening place. Here the protagonist actually has good cause to determinedly push on to this unpleasant wreck of a house to find all the papers hidden there — and they are indeed hidden without rhyme or reason throughout the house. The death of the last inhabitant was allegedly recent, but the estate has been falling into ruin for a good many years.  The rather desperate plight of the protagonist, Arthur Kipps, attorney, is set up well, and, rather like the decrepit house, Kipps has been grieving for his dead wife for four years and probably wouldn’t care at all about his debt and looming job loss but for his four-year-old son.  He must do this unpleasant task or face whatever English debtors face in the time between the Boer War and the first world war. 

Ciaran Hinds as Mr. Daily

How do we know when this takes place if we’re not experts about the single automobile seen?  As Kipps reads The Evening News on the train north (Daniel Radcliffe may never escape long train rides north), we see an ad about spiritualism and a medium endorsed by Arthur Conan Doyle.  That would place the story after the Boer War.  Everything else (clothing, candles instead of electricity or even gas lights, horse-drawn vehicles) definitively places the story earlier than World War I. 

Fourth, the performances in this film across the board are first rate.  Really.

• Daniel Radcliffe’s first foray into a feature film as an adult tells us that the boy’s still got it.  As young attorney and widower Arthur Kipps, his big blue eyes are woeful, his face lights up with amazed joy then crumples in bewildered despair.  Arthur is running on fumes, but Radcliffe is not.  He took the chance of doing a ghost story and carries it well.  He’s not yet a powerful player in the adult arena, but he’ll get there.
• The last few times I’ve seen Ciaran Hinds, I considered him miscast.  At last, in this film, it’s a fine fit as wealthy landowner Mr. Daily, the only man in the village with an automobile.  He is a sturdy, certain, god-fearing and loving man, who has suffered loss but still reaches out to help a stranger. 
•  The great Janet McTeer plays his wife.  She’s a little bit off, perhaps way off, but anyone who stays in this god-forsaken village is likely to be.  McTeer is delightful and fearless, her Mrs. Daily as loving to her “twins” as she would wish to be to her dead son.

Daniel Radcliffe and Janet McTeer

The people in this town are unpleasant. They lie, they stare, they close doors on poor Arthur, they’re downright mean.  Then we remember the opening scene of the film — one of very few in bright daylight, in which three pretty little girls interrupt their tea party.  They look in unison toward something we cannot see, then turn to look at the windows.  They go to the child-size windows, and….I don’t need to see the result, it’s searingly bright and horrific.   It’s an affecting and shocking scene in which there is no blood or gore.  Blood and gore aren’t scary, they’re just gross.  Director Watkins and screenwriter Jane Goldman (based on Susan Hill’s novel of the same title) get the horror genre better than many.  Together they create simple, sharp scenes with multiple characters; then long silent scenes with Arthur alone.  Or is he?

The villagers are not caricatures, even though we can think of them as the Innkeeper, the Innkeeper’s wife, the Lawyer, the Lawyer’s wife, the Cart Driver, the Landowner.  These may sound like stock characters, but the acting makes these people individuals instead.  This is a village of the damned.  All the people of the village are extremely well played, from Tim McMullan as the local lawyer Jerome and his wife Cathy Sara, to David Burke as the Constable.  Daniel Cerqueira as Keckwick the cart driver is surly and closed off.  But he has a name.  Later Arthur will call his name in the mist, in the dark. Keckwick is an echo of the whole village.  Liz White as Jennet, the Woman in Black, is haunting and haunted as she wreaks havoc and revenge against anyone and everyone.  The unfriendly Innkeeper and his wife, the Fishers, are well played by Shaun Dooley and Mary Stockley, each dealing with their losses differently.  Not to mention the exceedingly creepy children, particularly Aoife Doherty as Lucy Jerome and the children we meet first, the Fisher girls, Emma Shorey and Molly Harmon. The acting in this film is terrific and that makes it a lot of fun.

All in all, I enjoyed The Woman in Black:  It brings Hammer Films into the 21^st Century with a hoot and a holler, and I had a few good frights.  I would have enjoyed it more had the children behind me been off watching “Hugo” where they belonged.  When The Woman in Black is on DVD and I can control the viewing space — that is, the only juveniles behind me will be cats — I think I’ll enjoy it more despite the smaller screen.  After all, my current television screen is much larger than the old TV screens on which I saw many a memorably frightening film.

~ Molly Matera, signing off, but keeping the lights on....