Reviewed by James
Karas
The Shaw Festival’s brochure gives us fair notice about what to expect
from the production of Androcles and the Lion. The
production “will be a daring theatre experiment: everyone in the room, actors,
and audience, will have the chance to get involved.”
Even “daring” and “experiment” do not quite prepare you for the extent
of the interference, interpolations, violence and burlesque effects that are
done to a play that Shaw wrote.
Before the house lights go down for the
beginning of the performance, we see the cast on stage doing pushups, playing
games and talking to members of the audience. All friendly and congenial.
The cast of Androcles and the Lion. Photo by David Cooper.
The performance begins with a Host (a very affable Shawn Wright) making
some amusing remarks. He then tells us that plays used to begin with an
overture at one time. Sure enough, we get the large cast marching on stage playing a variety of musical instruments and
producing a cacophony that is very funny.
The host then reads from Shaw’s extensive stage directions, adlibbing
and engaging the audience. The lion of the play is chosen from the audience and
the dialogue of the Prologue as written
by Shaw begins between the hapless Androcles (Patrick Galligan) and his obnoxious
wife Megaera (Jenny L. Wright). But not for long. As Megaera complains that
Androcles is selfish, never thinks of her and the like, he turns to the audience
and asks “Have you ever heard that?” It gets a laugh.
The Prologue as done by Galligan and Wright is very funny with or
without the interpolations and other shenanigans and the lion from the audience
is highly entertaining. But the interference with the text is what Director Tim
Carroll has chosen as the way he wants this production and that style continues
for the rest of the performance.
But there is more. Cast members are asked to tell us what they are
thinking, about incidents or stories from their lives. They do and they do it
well. The stories they tell are interesting, humorous (is the timer on my oven
working so that when I go home the ribs will be ready?) and informative when
they read excerpts from Shaw’s lengthy Preface to the play explaining the
political thrust of the piece.
Does it work?
That depends on your attitude. If you are happy with the text of the
play being used like a crutch for burlesque and the creation of laughter with
little reference to what the author wrote, you will enjoy this production. In
the performance that I saw, most of the audience did. But if you believe that
the text should be respected and serious deviations, innumerable interpolations
and brutalization of the play should be reserved for, say, Monty Python then
you will not be thrilled by Tim Carroll’s approach.
Jeff Irving as
Ferrovius, Jay Turvey as Editor of the Gladiators and Jenny L. Wright as
Menagerie Keeper.
Photo by David Cooper
The performances by the cast were excellent and they would have done
justice to the play with less interference to the text by the director.
Galligan is touching and funny as the Greek tailor who pulls the thorn out of
the lion’s paw. Neil Barclay is hilarious as the king-size Emperor. Julia
Course is a very attractive Lavinia, a devout Christian who is also a fine
woman. Jeff Irving as Ferrovius is also a devout and powerful Christian who has
anger management problems and is hilarious within and outside the text of the
play.
Shawn Wright plays the Centurion, an ineffective martinet who gets more
laughs than obedience. The ensemble with their makeshift costumes and energetic
movements sometimes give the flavor of a high school production where nothing
goes as planned. That is the danger of
too much interference with the text even if you get the laughs.
The parameters for infidelity to the text and the freedom that a
director can take in the interpretation of a play are broad but they are not
unlimited. Carroll went well beyond any limitation and showed no respect for
the text. He sacrificed loyalty for the sake of laughter.
A comment made by Richard Bentley, a classicist, about Alexander Pope’s
translation is a propos: "It is a pretty poem, Mr. Pope, but you must not
call it Homer." Nor is Tim Carroll’s production of Androcles and the Lion a
play by Bernard Shaw.
______
Androcles and the Lion by Bernard Shaw
continues in repertory until October 15, 2017 at the Court Hose Theatre, Niagara-on-the-Lake, Ontario. www.shawfest.com.
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