Skip to main content

Saint Joan at the Samuel J. Friedman Theater at Manhattan Theater Club

When MTC announced they were reviving George Bernard Shaw's Saint Joan, I couldn't help but think, "Why? Who wants this?" And Condola Rashad is a very talented actress but is anyone clamoring to see her in this old, creaky play? (I'd argue she's not a draw in any role.)

I can say that yet again, MTC completely misses the mark with this production. I hate to be cruel but there are so many missteps that it's irredeemable.

Daniel Sullivan must take all of the blame. His Saint Joan is all over the map tone-wise. Some scenes are played broadly, with the comedy heightened. Is this the proper way to do the story of Joan of Arc? You could make the case that the church and the crown are buffoons in this story but you can't have them played like Saturday Night Live characters. Especially when the production shifts to a very serious tone during Joan's trial. Not to mention that embarrassingly bad epilogue; that truly felt like an SNL skit. I would've cut it altogether. Sure it mentions Joan's canonization, pardon, and legacy but that can't be unfamiliar to anyone in the audience.

And the whole thing is just so boring! It's almost three hours long, and it certainly feels like it. It moves at a glacial pace, and it doesn't help that the scenes themselves are incredibly long. The script is very talky, with little to no action. Some cuts to the text certainly would've been welcomed.

The design is downright ugly. Scott Pask's set of long, gold tubes, designed to look like bells, is so bulky and intrusive that it hinders the play. Jane Greenwood's costumes are shockingly bad, and look like cast-offs from an elementary school production of the story of Joan of Arc.


Sullivan also takes an incredibly talented group of actors and sends them out to sea. They are all over the place stylistically; some get the period of the piece, some don't even try and seem way too contemporary. Nobody is giving remotely strong performance. They are all just serviceable. Condola Rashad has no conviction in her Joan. She seems like a little girl playing dress up, and I don't believe for a second that men, hardened soldiers in the fifteenth century, would so blindly follow her. She moves around the stage with a "gee golly whiz!" wide-eyed look on her face. Even she can't believe this is all happening around her. It just doesn't work. (Also, whatever accent she's using is all over the place and incomprehensible. Someone should've told her to lose it.)

I hate to say this but this production is so inessential that it feels like a waste of time. I don't know how anyone can argue for a new revival of Saint Joan in 2018. Does there need to be a reason for a revival? No, I don't think so. But make it make sense. I just can't imagine anyone was sitting around thinking, "Gee, I'd love to see a production of Saint Joan. I hope someone revives it!" The MTC production simply makes a terrible, terrible case for such a long, creaky play.


Labels

Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Amy and the Orphans by Lindsey Ferrentino at the Roundabout Theatre Company

There's so much to celebrate about Lindsey Ferrentino's Amy and the Orphans. The play is not only one of the better things of the season but it manages to be funny, entertaining, well-acted, and a major victory for inclusion. Ferrentino's title character has Down Syndrome, and is played by Jamie Brewer, who also has the disease (as does her understudy, Eddie Barbanell. The play becomes Andy and the Orphans when he plays the role.) Amy is never the butt of a joke, never a punch line, and is never exploited, as writers and directors often tend to do when dealing with disabled actors or characters. But of course, that's Ferrentino's intention. Amy has been locked away in group homes (some terrible, some good) her entire life, with limited time spent with her own family. She has had to fend for herself but has developed into a strong individual with likes and dislikes, and even has a boyfriend and a job. Amy has clearly had to overcome a great deal in her life, and...
Post a Comment
Read more

Fireflies by Donja R. Love at the Atlantic Theater Company

Okay, look, I get it, two-handers are tough. You have two characters with which to tell your story, and you have to somehow tell this story with as little exposition as possible. You have to show, not tell. Are you listening, Donja Love? Love's current play, Fireflies , tells the story of a married African American couple in 1963. He's a preacher, traveling the southern part of the country to speak at the funerals of other African Americans who have died due to racial terrorism. (When the play begins, the church bombing that claimed the lives of four little girls in Birmingham has just occurs.) She's a doting and devoted housewife who goes so far as to write her husband's speeches and sermons for him. But what her husband, Charles, doesn't know is that she secretly smokes, she wants to abort the baby she's carrying, and she writes explicit letters to a woman she's in love with whom she only met once, briefly. Oh, and did I mention she, Olivia, has PTSD a...
Post a Comment
Read more

Harry Potter and the Cursed Child at the Lyric Theater

Well, here we are, folks. The last review of the 2017-2018 season. And what a show to go out on. Harry Potter and the Cursed Child is simply an event. The Lyric theater has been renovated for the show, the marquee is bigger than anything we've ever seen in New York (akin to the gorgeous facades we see in London), the merch is plentiful, you can order drinks at your seat through an app, people are walking around in wizard robes. These two plays are unlike anything we've ever seen on Broadway. And in a sense, it seems simply like a cash-grab. We've done the novels, the movies, the theme park, of course there should be a stage show. This is all a part of Harry Potter brand. Quite frankly, it seems very icky when you think about it. Is this what Broadway has come to? And yes, the rumors are true: the script itself isn't the most perfect. It's not that it's not well-written, it just lacks any sense of nuisance that you'd find in strong dramatic writing. Yes, ...
Post a Comment
Read more