Word: mcelvain
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...costumes, despite their drawbacks, are subordinate to other aspects of the play. Poor acting and directing might hamper success far more. Richard McElvain as Tartuffe and Janet Rodgers as Elmire stand out, but the entire cast of Tartuffe is strong. McElvain marches solemnly up and down stairs, hands clasped or crossed across his breast, head bent in humility, eyes wily and darting everywhere. He smacks his lips greedily when fingering Elmire or household cash...
Elmire reminds the skeptical Orgon to reveal himself before things go too far. McElvain descends the stairs with utmostholy piety; Rodgers leads him on with an ironic smile. Sneering at Orgon's simplicity, McElvain rips off his hairshirt (revealing clean linen underneath) and prepares to go at it. Director Grey Johnson draws out the scene for all it's worth, keeping Orgon (Bill McCann) under the table until Tartuffe has practically consummated the affair. Rodgers, displaying genuine alarm, keeps kicking McCann under the table, unable to believe he could hesitate so long before putting a stop to things. Johnson controls...
...good effort goes for naught, however, because of Richard McElvain's one-dimensional Macbeth. This is a pouty shlep of a thane--Felix Unger with broadsword. Again, it works fine in Act Five, when his "life's but a walking shadow," but we are bored mercilessly beforehand. How this guy gets to be king is certainly beyond comprehension. If he has vaulting ambition, then Ronald Reagan has naturally black hair...
...PERFORMANCE really has to fall flat. Macbeth depicts one man's willing excursion into hell, which means that he must start this side of it and must have some reasons for taking the trip. McElvain gives no hint of this, and we cannot sympathize with his unraveling as we can with Lady Macbeth's. Lost is the tragedy and ambiguity, replaced by a melodramatic "good guy wins." We're rather glad to see the creep done...
Lear's entourage--Martha Jussaume's Cordelia, Tom Dinger's Fool, Richard McElvain's Kent--clearly got the word from Cain to "be loving," to be tender, to fit his interpretation of the play in the program notes. They hug each other a lot, hold each other's arms, "are supportive," as the psychologists say; they form pieta-like tableaux of familial affection. There's little wrong with that, and it might make a valid production of Lear someday, but all the actors--not just the nuclear family--would have to work towards realizing it, and the director would have...
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