Ovid’s Pygmallion
PYGMALION by George Bernard Shaw. Directed by Jonathan Moscone. California Shakespeare Theater, Bruns Amphitheater, 100 California Shakespeare Theater Way, Orinda, CA 94563. (just off Highway 24 at the California Shakespeare Theater Way/Wilder Rd. exit, one mile east of the Caldecott Tunnel). 510.548.9666 or www.calshakes.org. July 30 – August 24, 2014.
CalShakes produces a winner with Pygmalion. [rating:5] (5 of 5 Stars)
Modern audiences know the plot of George Bernard Shaw’s 1914 play Pygmalion from seeing the musical comedy My Fair Lady. Shaw mostly lifted the story from Ovid who was born in 43 BC. In that story Pygmalion was a sculpture who created a beautiful statue of a woman named Galatea. The statue, whom he fell in love with, came to life when he touched the marble. In Shaw’s play the erstwhile sculpture is Henry Higgins a professor of phonetics and his creation of a “princess fit to be a consort for Kings” is a scruffy London flower girl named Eliza Doolittle. Unlike Ovid’s Pygmalion who fell hopelessly in love with his creation, Shaw insists that is not so with his Pygmalion, now named Henry Higgins. Although many directors of the play have toyed with that idea Jonathon Moscone sticks with Shaw’s premise.
There are several editions of the play Pygmalion that are in print. Shaw’s original premise of the final relationship between Eliza Doolittle and Professor Higgins is one of equality. Directorial whims have often changed that. Shaw recognized the difficultly of staging the play and the need for “exceptionally elaborate machinery.” He thus suggested scenes that could be omitted. These facts did not dismay the always inventive director Jonathon Moscone who apparently has used the original text although truncated version staging the play in two acts rather than five. He has gathered a superb cast that received a standing ovation on opening night at the chilly open-air venue.
When entering the outdoor Bruns Amphitheater there is a colorful relatively bare stage with an unadorned semicircular stairway stage right leading to an upstairs exit and a central stage level open area. As the lights dim and are relit the opening scene is Covent Garden vegetable market and a diverse group are caught in a rainstorm. There are those elegant ones leaving the Theatre mingling with the street workers including a scruffy flower girl Eliza Doolittle (Irene Lucio). We are immediately treated to Moscone’s inventiveness when members of the crowd are simply one-dimensional life-size cutouts of men and women in elegant dress. Three of the real live patrons are the Eynsford-Hills, mother (Julie Eccles), daughter Clara (Elyse Price) and hapless Freddie (Nicholas Pelczar).
Into that scene weaves a strange man taking notes and is assumed to be a ‘copper’ but is really Henry Higgins. Through a series mishaps there is an encounter between Higgins, Eliza and Colonel Pickering (L. Peter Callander) with Higgins making a flippant remark that he could pass off the “squashed cabbage” flower girl as a duchess merely by teaching her to speak properly thus setting the scene for the rest of the play.
(L to R) L. Peter Callender as Colonel Pickering, Irene Lucio as Eliza Doolittle, and Anthony Fusco as Professor Henry Higgins, photo by Kevin Berne
Setting the scene is a marvel of ingenuity with the ensemble adeptly moving bookcases, sofa, chairs, tables and other paraphernalia onto stage creating a stylish working bachelor flat for scene two. Pickering has moved in with Higgins and they are exchanging their knowledge. Into this bucolic setting ruled over by housekeeper Mrs. Pearce (Catherine Castellanos), intrudes Eliza offering to pay for lessons to improve her speech so that she could get a job as a shop girl. The interaction between four characters is a marvel of superb dialog that was lifted practically verbatim by Lerner and Loewe’s My Fair Lady. In fact those creators of the musical wisely use Shaw’s words for many of their songs that you might even sing to yourself . . . but please don’t.
Enter dustman Alfred Doolittle (James Carpenter) Eliza’s father and once again Shaw’s brilliance combined with Carpenter’s dynamic stage presence and his ability to sub serve his own personality becoming the character he is playing is worth the cost of admission. His re-entrance in the penultimate scene dressed in the wedding finery befitting his new station in life saddled with “middle-class morality” is a gem.
In fact, the entire play is a gem. Anthony Fusco is the perfect Henry Higgins and makes the pivotal role his own. Irene Lucio has a fitful start with her Cockney accent in scene one but grows beautifully into the role deserving her rousing applause when she gracefully challenges the bullying Higgins while standing on the upper level of the set. Is Moscone telling us that she has the upper hand?
Again Moscone’s ingenuity is apparent as he has elected to by-pass the tedious lesson scenes with talk-overs to indicate the passage of time allowing the ensemble to reset the stage for the sitting room of Henry’s mother (Sharon Lockwood). He is there to test Eliza’s ability to mingle with London Society. With the Eynsford-Hills in attendance Higgins passes off her remarks as “the new small talk”, and Freddy is enraptured. When she is leaving, he asks her if she is going to walk across the park, to which she replies, “Walk? Not bloody likely!” (This is the most famous line from the play.)
Although the versatile L. Peter Callender creates the caring personality of Pickering with great nuance, it is the ladies of the cast who are most memorable. Catherine Castellanos gives authority to her role as Mrs. Pearce. Beautiful Julie Eccles is elegant as Mrs. Eynsford Hill and Sharon Lockwood as Mrs. Higgins steals the scenes with her full authority being unbowed by her badgering son. Nicholas Pelcazar and Elyse Price hold their own in lesser roles and the ensemble could not be better. Three cheers for Anna Oliver for her marvelous costumes and Annie Smart for her ingenious sets.
This is a must, must see show and Moscone has pared Shaw’s verbosity down to two hours and twenty minutes including the intermission.
Featuring: Anthony Fusco* (Professor Henry Higgins); L. Peter Callender* (Colonel Pickering); Irene Lucio* (Eliza Doolittle); James Carpenter* (Alfred Doolittle); Sharon Lockwood* (Mrs. Higgins); Catherine Castellanos* (Mrs. Pearce); Nicholas Pelczar* (Freddy Eynsford Hill); Julie Eccles* (Mrs. Eynsford Hill); Elyce Price* (Clara Eynsford Hill); Ponder Goddard* (Parlormaid/Ensemble); Catherine Luedtke (Ensemble); Caitlin Evenson (Ensemble); Charles Lewis III (Ensemble); Liam Callister (Ensemble).
Creative Crew: Designed by Annie Smart (set designer), Anna Oliver (costume designer), Stephen Strawbridge (lighting designer; Jake Rodriguez (Sound designer); Laxmi Kumaran (stage manager); Lynne Soffer (dialect & text coach).
Kedar K. Adour, MD
Courtesy of www.theatreworldinternetmagazine.com
