Word: casted
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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...VERY USED to things happening rapidly," chirps convent-bred Alizon Eliot in Christopher Fry's The Lady's Not for Burning. The current Dunster House production of the existential comedy-drama should give her little reason to fret. In three acts spanning almost as many hours, the cast of this show prattles prosaically but interminably about whether it is more significant to hang, burn or continue with the business of living in the dreary Middle Ages. By the end of it all, the resolution of these and other conflicts in the plot seems less important than the necessity to stretch...
Beyond making themselves understood, however, some of the cast falter, unsure whether to play the operetta utterly deadpan--letting the audience laugh at these ridiculous characters--or to reveal that they, too, know the whole thing is a joke. Catherine Weary's sparkling Josephine holds the stage through sheer vocal perfection alone--she could probably handle Puccini with ease. Donald Hovey's Ralph Rackstraw, too, has a full, clean tenor. Now, admittedly there isn't all that much anyonecan make of the milquetoast roles of the love-struck couple; but both Weary and Hovey shuffle between dead seriousness and deadpan...
...seem to know instinctively that they have to keep a lot of activity on stage, and their duet, "Things Are Seldom What They Seem," was the best number of the evening. Weary may sing better, but Falk and Woo tiptoe, mug and enliven their business the way the whole cast might have...
EXCELLENT singing and enunciation keep this Pinaforeafloat, through scenes and scenes of half-hearted dancing and stage business. Not until the middle of the second act does the cast loosen up, and give a taste of what the entire show could have been like. In the traditional encores after the trio, "Never Mind the Why and Wherefore," Prince, Falk and Weary suddenly perk up and begin to command the Loeb stage. It doesn't matter that many of their routines are classic D'Oyly Carte fare--they start to look like they're having fun. The rest...
Whether it was the director who couldn't motivate his cast, or the cast who were just a little bored by this warhouse, the Gilbert and Sullivan Players took Pinafore for granted; they didn't put in the energy it needs. Theirs is still an over-whelmingly competent production, with superb singing--one worth seeing of you lovePinafore, love Gilbert and Sullivan, or just love watching all those funny, cute Englishmen acting so very English. But then, the Loeb is sold out already. Ironically, enough people love Pinafore as a harmless trifle that it can be de-fanged with impunity...