Word: mariani
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Candida, by George Bernard Shaw, directed by Lorenzo Mariani, is at the Loeb Mainstage Thursday through Saturday at 8 p.m. Tickets can be bought at the Loeb...
...central problem with Lorenzo Mariani's direction is his mishandling of an obviously talented cast. Both Jonathan Epstein as Morell and Jonathan Emerson as Marchbanks deliver perfectly consistent, self-contained performances; unfortunately, the two characterizations are completely out of synch with each other. Epstein's Parson Morell partakes of the tragic stature of Pastor Manders in Ibsen's Ghosts, a part Epstein played last year. It is a moving, sympathetic portrayal, but its naturalism stands in uneasy contrast to Emerson's frenetic, histrionic, almost self-parodying Marchbanks. As the timid poet, Emerson shrinks, flinches and mugs...
...greater sense of what Shaw is about. Cynthia Cardon is just right as Prossy, Morell's secretary and admirer, snapping out her consonants, as Shaw once suggested she should, with a "ten pound gun hammer spring." Thomas Champion, as Burgess, Candida's father, has a laudable Cockney accent, and Mariani himself oozes idolatrous servility as the cleric Lexy. One of the most successful scenes in the production is the comic encounter between Prossy, Burgess and Marchbanks; in this run-in with characters who have the outlines of caricature, Marchbanks' own exaggerated mannerisms find their proper context...
...weak Miss Lonelyhearts tilts the balance of the play in Shrike's favor, and Lorenzo Mariani as the sharp-talking features editor makes the most of it. Poor Miss Lonelyhearts never really stands a chance. Mariani's magnificent presence and resonant voice dominate the stage, as he enunciates West's vision in a way that mixes cynicism with sense. Especially fine is Mariani's handling of Shrike's monologue, in which he relentlessly demonstrates to a bed-ridden Miss Lonelyhearts the futility of traditional means of escape...
Complementing Mariani's able performance is a strong supporting cast. Patrick O'Neill's Doyle is a pitiful yet somewhat ominous figure, and Rebecca Landrum as his frowzy and frustrated wife manifests a pathetic willfulness in her pursuit of Miss Lonelyhearts that is immensely effective. Together, they make an appropriately ill-matched couple, a fatal reification of those pain-filled letters which are Miss Lonelyhearts' particular curse...