Shaw's 'Houses' withstands test of time Playwright's first work has Dickensian overtones
but contemporary feel
by Hedy Weiss
Theater Critic,
published May 8, 2007
HIGHLY RECOMMENDED
To stir up the storm patterns in the trans-Atlantic theater world, you need only pose a single question: Who are the better actors, the Brits or the Americans?
After watching TimeLine Theatre's sublime production of "Widowers' Houses," George Bernard Shaw's first play -- and one that holds within it all the comedy of male-female relationships, all the hypocrisy of male bonding and all the outrage at social inequity that will be developed in his many successive dramas -- you can easily reach one conclusion. And that is: The current crop of Chicago actors and directors have few peers when it comes to nailing Shaw, and they bring to his work all the sparkle and bite it demands.
TimeLine has mounted an altogether glittering production, from its zestily paced, pitch-perfect direction by Kevin Fox to the snap-crackle-and-pop performances of its cast to its swell-elegant set design by Brian Sidney Bembridge.
And though Shaw himself might have disparaged his 1892 debut work, he was wrong. It's a gem. In fact, were you to invite the remaining residents of, say, Cabrini-Green to come see it, they would no doubt howl with recognition.
"Widowers' Houses" is about money, class, real estate, power politics, the politics of poverty and the way personal interest invariably trumps personal ethics. There is a touch of Charles Dickens in it all, but there also is a starkly contemporary mind-set at play.
Trench (a winningly naive PJ Powers) is a newly licensed young doctor with high social connections but little money. He has fallen madly in love with Blanche (wickedly good Kathy Logelin), a bright, spoiled and volatile young woman whose father, Sartorius (David Parkes, with a hairstyle as sharp as his character), is immensely rich and entirely self-made. He is determined that his only daughter will find complete acceptance in the upper class.
Things seem to be on track for a marriage when the source of Sartorius' wealth is discovered. As it happens, he is a notorious London slumlord, and this stain is a shock to the liberal-minded Trench. Though still hoping to marry Blanche, he insists they live only on his meager salary. Unaware of her father's "business," she intends to maintain the style to which she has grown accustomed. Things fall apart, at least for a time. And the root of all evil (money, or the lack of it) comes in for some hugely engaging disputation.
Mark Richard is hilarious as Trench's oh-so-proper pal who can be bought for a song. Terry Hamilton is sublime as Lickcheese, an Alfred P. Doolittle precursor. And Liza Fernandez is tops as the wily maid who deftly catches on to the rules of the game.
