Word: tourvel
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...looking almost straight down on the heads of the players on the stage. I don't know the book - I read a rave review in the Times and wanted to see something "classy." I'm enjoying the Christopher Hampton dialogue very much, very clever, deliciously malicious. Suddenly, Madame de Tourvel collapses at the feet of Allan Rickman's Valmont. A shiver like a drug rush runs down my spine...
Their pawns include La Presidente de Tourvel (Nikki Columbus '97), a virtuous married woman whom Valmont successfully seduces and then rejects. Valmont delights in corrupting virtue with sensual sinfulness. Cecile Volanges (Sara Boyle '00) and Madame de Volanges (Anna Lewis '99), who are embroiled in their own mother-daughter struggle over whether Le Chevalier Danceny (Daniel Sussner '00) is suitable marriage material for Cecile, also fall victim to Valmont and Mertueil's scheme. Madame de Rosemonde (Vanessa Reisen '97), Valmont's aunt, possesses the deepest understanding of the play's web of deceit. In a downhearted acceptance of the production...
...capable acting is complemented by an imaginative set, which suggests the salons and bedrooms of upperclass chateaux. The period costumes are similarly impressive, and fashion reveals much about the social situation of the characters in the play. At one point, La Marquise de Mertueil remarks that La Presidente de Tourvel is a frump, with her "bodice up to her ears in case you might catch a glimpse of a square inch of flesh." The tense music and occasional operatic singing that bridges the scenes is also a nice touch, and prevents the pauses between scenes from becoming awkward...
...play's energy only slows down towards the end, when Valmont and Mertueil's scheme starts to wreak havoc in their own lives. Valmont is torn between La Presidente de Tourvel, whom he claims to have fallen in love with, and La Marquise de Mertueil, who holds considerable power over him. The sense of unspoken attachment between Leach and Brawley is perhaps too good, because this turn of events does not seem believable. There is a fatal swordfight between Valmont and Le Chevalier Danceny that continues for too long, stretching out the play's final scenes when they should...
Colin Graham's production, which will be telecast nationally over PBS on Oct. 17, is simple but handsome, relying on mirrors and projections to make its effects. Notable performances by the mostly American cast include Renee Fleming's poignant Tourvel, Mary Mills' tender Cecile (the 15-year-old girl "ruined" by Valmont's depredations) and Johanna Meier's stately Madame de Rosemonde, Valmont's doting aunt. In the pit, Scottish-born Donald Runnicles leads with authority...