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The Country Wife sends Restoration hypocrisy aloft
By Hope Green
Had today's gossip columnists lived during the Restoration, they never
would have lacked material.
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Ryan Sypek (CFA'04), Scarlett Forsman (CFA'04), Morgan Maltzman (CFA'02), Philip Taratula (CFA'04), and Jessica Hain (CFA'04) (from left). Maltzman plays Margery Pinchwife, a young country bride who dresses as a man to mingle with the startled London in-crowd. Photos by Vernon Doucette |
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William Wycherley, one of the leading English dramatists of the time,
certainly had enough to inspire him: he shared a mistress with King Charles
II and mingled with the king's many unsavory writer friends. Accordingly,
his bawdy comedies, such as The Country Wife (1675), CFA's spring mainstage
production at the Boston University Theatre, reflect the adultery and
hypocrisy of the upper classes in late 17th-century London.
The BU production will be set in 1800, another period of transition and
scandal for London nobility. But the original story remains intact. At
the center of the action is playboy Harry Horner, played by Alessandro
Colla (CFA'02), who pretends to have been emasculated by syphilis so he
can convince preoccupied businessmen to let him escort their wives to
functions around town. The ruse works: he beds all the women he wants
while the wives maintain their reputations -- until a sheltered country
bride named Margery Pinchwife breaks the rules by falling in love with
him.
"It's a very funny play," says director Lisa Wolpe. "It's
a sparkling sexual farce about married women who are being kept inside
a marital cage and the beautiful men who come to court them. The challenge
is in the cleverness of the text and the superficiality of the plot, and
how to keep it all moving, but I think the students will do very well."
CFA seniors in the cast had practice with the language of Restoration
comedies during their required London internships last year. In rehearsing
The Country Wife, they are getting more intensive coaching in speech and
movement.
"It's not a kitchen-sink play, where your natural behavior would
come out," says Morgan Maltzman (CFA'02), who is cast in the title
role. "For the best comic payoff, the timing has to be right and
your movements need to be really sharp and clear."
Like some of the other characters, Margery Pinchwife delivers frequent
asides and a brief monologue to the audience, one of Maltzman's favorite
aspects of the show. Her least favorite part is the corset she has to
wear under her Napoleonic-era costume.
"It's OK for the first 10 minutes," she says, "but after
4 hours of rehearsing in it, I just can't wait to undo the laces, breathe,
and stretch."
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| Philip Taratula (Sparkish), Jessica Hain (a town whore), and Morgan Maltzman as Margery Pinchwife. | |
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The production is a proving ground for theater design students as well.
The task for David Reynoso (CFA'03) has been to create sets that accurately
mirror the values or quirks of the main characters. The narcissistic Horner,
for instance, has a 30-foot-tall peacock in his living room. The house
of Mr. Pinchwife, who tries in vain to keep his wife away from the city,
resembles a cage.
"This is my first mainstage production as a designer, which I must
say was a leap of faith on my advisors' part," says Reynoso. "They've
been very supportive."
Last year Reynoso designed a set for a production in Studio 210, a smaller
venue within the BU Theatre building. "I did the set for $14, with
twine and woven pieces of fabric," he says. "You just kind of
learn as you go -- by diving into it."
Wolpe, artistic director of the Los Angeles Women's Shakespeare Company,
has developed strong ties with the Boston theater scene over the past
four years, performing with such professional companies as the Revels
and Shakespeare and Company and teaching at Emerson College, MIT, and
BU. She directed CFA students in The Tempest last fall and will return
in September to direct another Shakespeare production.
"Our students find it a unique stretch doing this kind of material,"
she says of The Country Wife. "It will serve them well, as they will
probably work at a lot of Shakespeare festivals, where they will be called
on to play monarchs and princes. So their experience in this kind of world
will be very useful to them."
The Boston University College of Fine Arts school of theatre arts presents The Country Wife by William Wycherley, directed by Lisa Wolpe, on Wednesday and Thursday, May 1 and 2, at 7:30 p.m., on Friday and Saturday, May 3 and 4, at 8 p.m., and on Sunday, May 5, at 2 p.m. at the Boston University Theatre, 264 Huntington Ave. Tickets are $10 general admission and $5 for senior citizens, students, BU alumni, and Huntington Theatre Company subscribers. For more information, call 617-266-0800.
26 April 2002
Boston University
Office of University Relations