The Parsons Noseletter

"Does it make me look fat?"

Jean Baptiste Poquelin was born and raised in Paris, about five blocks from the Louvre, which was, at the time, one of several Royal Palaces. His father was an upholsterer to the King. His mother died when he was about ten years old, and his grandfather took him often to the carnival-like atmosphere of puppet shows and sideshows along the Seine, where his love of theater began. In his early twenties, young Jean Baptiste rejected his study of law and his father’s dream of following in his footsteps – though he remained a member of his father’s guild – to become an actor, at the time a disreputable occupation. He joined the Bejart Company after falling in love with its leading lady, young Madeline Bejart. A new company, Le Theatre Illustre, was formed, and Jean Baptiste took the name “Moliere” to save his family from dishonor. Their attempts at tragedy failed and to avoid further debt the company left Paris, touring the provinces and developing their own work for the next seventeen years.

Now here’s where we come – “at last”, you might say – to our February presentation.  My interpretations of Moliere favor the spirit of these early works, in which I believe his comic genius came to fruition. He was very much influenced by the touring Italian troupes, the “commedia dell arte” players, and their robust, irreverent and physical style of acting. Language is minimized, absurd plots and characters emphasized. Curmudgeonly old men are stingy, and eager to get a good deal in arranged marriages for their children. Young lovers are self- absorbed, but extremely willful. And oppressed servants are inevitably co-opted into some arcane scheme to thwart the parents and restore True Love to its rightful preeminence. Norman Lear and “It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia”, say thank you.

Among Moliere’s provincial works were “The Flying Doctor” (1645) and “The Ridiculous Young Ladies” (1650). Under cover of comedy Moliere pokes fun at the gullibility of the old, the sham of false medicine, and the absurdity of extreme fashion. In “The Flying Doctor” old Gorgibus is ready to sacrifice all at the suggestion of servant Sganarelle’s “Doctor” in order to match his daughter to his wealthy old friend. In “The Ridiculous Young Ladies” two narcissistic girls from the provinces are prepared to do whatever necessary to take Paris by storm. Both themes were ripe for comedy in the provinces of France in 1650, proved so again in its capital in 1658, and are alive and well in Archie Bunker and Kim Kardashian today.

Moliere wrote the comedy of Obsession. In that way he was very much a conservative, believing in balance and order, and after his triumphant return to Paris in 1658 he became the theater darling of a resourceful, young Louis XIV, who knew a rapier when he saw one. He served the King in Paris, at Versailles and Fontainebleau for the next fifteen years, dying after a performance of “The Imaginary Invalid” in Paris on February 17, 1673. Because he was an actor it took the King’s special dispensation to allow his Christian burial, by night, in an unmarked cemetery plot in a Paris churchyard.

“A Christmas Carol” by Charles Dickens in a one hour, Readers’ Theater adaptation by Lance Davis

Saturday December 17 at 2 PM and 7 PM; Sunday,  December 18 at 2 PM

Lineage Performing Arts Center, 89 S. Fair Oaks, Pasadena, CA 91005

PayWhatYouWill, but reservations necessary. Go to www.parsonsnose.com or call 626-403-7667.

Remember how you hated Dickens when you were in high school because you had to have fifty pages of “Great Expectations” read by Monday and his descriptions just went on and on and on? Well I have a suggestion, and you’ll really thank me. Call your local bookseller (this really is a hardcover worth owning) and order Michael Patrick Hearn’s “An Annotated Christmas Carol”.

When you get it, block out an hour in the evening, make yourself a cocoa with whipped cream, or maybe even a glass of port and piece of Stilton, and begin to read one of the greatest writers the English language has ever known. Guess what? You don’t have to rush. You don’t have a deadline. It won’t be on the test. You are now an educated adult, and you have earned the license to take your time and savor something you won’t get on television…language. Your language.

Immerse yourself in the world of London, 1842. Hear the horses, the shop bells, the chatter. Smell the smoking fires, horse dung and burnt chestnuts. Feel the chill on your nose, and maybe the drip. Feel the emotions, the pain of Belle’s parting, the loneliness of the boy Scrooge, never sent for at Chrismas.

Put yourself in Dickens’ hands, for they are very capable. Maybe on the next night you’ll pass the book back and forth with someone, taking turns reading a paragraph or two. Mark the voices and try the dialects. I’m betting it may even become a new tradition.
Merry Christmas. I hope to see you at our readings, and please, if you can, remember us in your donations.  God bless. – LD

Follow us on Twitter, if you can figure it out. (I know I’m having trouble. In Dickens’ day you would send a note in the post if you were wealthy, or one of your kids if you were not!

ParsonsNoseProd; https://twitter.com/#!/ParsonsNoseProd/

#Pasadena

Written by Dion Boucicault; adapted by Lance Davis

Saturdays November 12, 19 and 26 at 2 PM and 7 PM

Sundays November 13, 20 and 27 at 2 PM

Tickets $20 Adults; $10 Students and Over 60

Tickets: www.parsonsnose.com or 626-403-7667

Lineage Performing Arts Center, 89 South Fair Oaks Ave., Pasadena, CA 91105

Running time 1 hour plus intermission

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Some years ago I toured in a summer stock production of “The Streets of New York” with Farley Granger and Orson Bean. (Stories to tell there!)  It was a great favorite on the circuit. Today’s audiences readily enjoyed the interactive “boos” and “yays” of the melodramatic form.

“Streets” was written in 1857 by the great 19th Century Irish actor and playwright Dionysus Boucicault, taken from a French play, “The Poor of Paris” by Edward Nus. Boucicault added a “fire” scene to accommodate the popular demand for spectacle, and also changed the local references to the city it played, in London “The Poor of London,” “The Poor of Liverpool,” “The Poor of Dublin.” The word “Poor” was also changed to “Streets” in several productions.

Boucicault was a true man of the theater. Born in 1820 in Dublin to a relatively well –to –do family, he became an actor, then playwright and producer with a keen sense of the audience’s taste. The stock market crashes of 1837 and 1857 set the scene for the play. As in Dickens, the shocking financial reversals of the wealthy and their newfound appreciation for the core values of the impoverished were favorite themes of the melodramas of the day. Boucicault also had an innate sense of comedy which we see not only in “Streets” but in his hit comedy “London Assurance” – revived on Broadway in 2009 – and his career vehicle for the great 19th Century American star Joseph Jefferson, “Rip Van Winkle,” which Parson’s Nose revived in 2005.

I hope you enjoy my version of the play. I think it’s in the spirit of Boucicault, though admittedly I’ve incorporated Parson’s Nose “panto” touches. It’s been great fun to insert, as he did, local references, to Pasadena and its citizens. I’ve tried to offer it with a kind humor, and trust our audiences to receive with same. Thanks in advance to Mayor Bill Bogaard for allowing the use of his name as the villain banker. I assured him that though Aloysius receives most of the “boos” in the piece his actions can be attributed not only to greed but to a misplaced love of his wicked daughter.

Please join us for an hour, bring your whole family, and relish the interactive cheers and hisses of our theater heritage. This is what theater does best. No screens!

Mayor Bogaard visits Parson's Nose!

(image: lautrec: bernhardt in Phedre)

Just on a lark I was listening to some Edison cylinders made in early 20th century. One was a recording of Sarah Bernhardt’s “Phedre” by Racine, a contemporary of Moliere. Moliere didn’t have much luck with tragedy. It was performed, in the 17th Century, in a declamatory style that his comedies were praised for avoiding. Indeed his style was a brilliant mixture of outrageous Italian “commedia dell arte” and everyday, almost naturalistic delivery, which we try to incorporate into our work at Parson’s Nose.

But it was fascinating to listen to Bernhardt building her speeches, especially as she crescendoes at the end. Though at first her delivery seems formal – it is rhymed 17th century poetry after all – you can hear the absolute commitment and passion, masterfully calibrated, that pours from her soul.This is the incorporation of technique and suppressed emotion that so many of our “method” actors can’t do, and what the classics demand. A film script gives at the most ten lines of a monologue to work through, with as many takes as the director allows. A classic theater monologue demands the ability to deliver three times that – (read below) – and make it understood, without microphones, in a 1500 seat house, and make it believable, and do it again for the evening performance. As in musical comedy, you have to be an athlete.

I’ve always thought France must be a wonderful place to be an actress. They do madness so well. Isabelle Adjani’s made a career of it (see “Claudine Claudel” or was that Huppert?, “La Reine Margot”) and Kristin Scott Thomas has always had a lot of fun over there. She seems to return to England and America when she wants to do something relatively staid. Adjani, as I recall, was one of the youngest actresses admitted to the Comedie Francaise, from its school, but preferred going into film. And now Scott Thomas is returning to her theater roots.

So grab a wine, or an iced tea, have a listen, read along, and see if you can keep up. She’s quite something.

Click here for Sarah Bernhardt\’s \”Phedre\” on Edison cylinder

PHEDRE
Oui, Prince, je languis, je brûle pour Thésée.
Je l’aime, non point tel que l’ont vu les enfers,
Volage adorateur de mille objets divers,
Qui va du Dieu des morts déshonorer la couche ;
Mais fidèle, mais fier, et même un peu farouche,
Charmant, jeune, traînant tous les coeurs après soi,
Tel qu’on dépeint nos Dieux, ou tel que je vous voi.
Il avait votre port, vos yeux, votre langage,
Cette noble pudeur colorait son visage,
Lorsque de notre Crète il traversa les flots,
Digne sujet des voeux des filles de Minos.
Que faisiez-vous alors ? Pourquoi sans Hyppolyte
Des héros de la Grèce assembla-t-il l’élite ?
Pourquoi, trop jeune encor, ne pûtes-vous alors
Entrer dans le vaisseau qui le mit sur nos bords ?
Par vous aurait péri le monstre de la Crète,
Malgré tous les détours de sa vaste retraite.
Pour en développer l’embarras incertain,
Ma soeur du fil fatal eût armé votre main.
Mais non, dans ce dessein je l’aurais devancée :
L’amour m’en eût d’abord inspiré la pensée.
C’est moi, Prince, c’est moi dont l’utile secours
Vous eût du Labyrinthe enseigné les détours.
Que de soins m’eût coûté cette tête charmante !
Un fil n’eût point assez rassuré votre amante.
Compagne du péril qu’il vous fallait chercher,
Moi-même devant vous j’aurais voulu marcher ;
Et Phèdre, au Labyrinthe avec vous descendue,
Se serait avec vous retrouvée ou perdue.

HIPPOLYTE
Dieux ! qu’est-ce que j’entends ? Madame, oubliez-vous
Que Thésée est mon père et qu’il est votre époux ?

PHEDRE
Et sur quoi jugez-vous que j’en perds la mémoire,
Prince ? Aurais-je perdu tout le soin de ma gloire; ?

HIPPOLYTE
Madame, pardonnez. J’avoue, en rougissant,
Que j’accusais à tort un discours innocent.
Ma honte ne peut plus soutenir votre vue ;
Et je vais…

PHEDRE
Ah ! cruel, tu m’as trop entendue.
Je t’en ai dit assez pour te tirer d’erreur.
Hé bien ! connais donc Phèdre et toute sa fureur.
J’aime. Ne pense pas qu’au moment que je t’aime,
Innocente à mes yeux je m’approuve moi-même,
Ni que du fol amour qui trouble ma raison
Ma lâche complaisance ait nourri le poison.
Objet infortuné des vengeances célestes,
Je m’abhorre encor plus que tu ne me détestes.
Les Dieux m’en sont témoins, ces Dieux qui dans mon flanc
Ont allumé le feu fatal à tout mon sang,
Ces Dieux qui se sont fait une gloire; cruelle
De séduire le coeur d’une faible mortelle.
Toi-même en ton esprit rappelle le passé.
C’est peu de t’avoir fui, cruel, je t’ai chassé.
J’ai voulu te paraître odieuse, inhumaine.
Pour mieux te résister, j’ai recherché ta haine.
De quoi m’ont profité mes inutiles soins ?
Tu me haïssais plus, je ne t’aimais pas moins.
Tes malheurs te prêtaient encor de nouveaux charmes.
J’ai langui, j’ai séché, dans les feux, dans les larmes.
Il suffit de tes yeux pour t’en persuader,
Si tes yeux un moment pouvaient me regarder.
Que dis-je ? Cet aveu que je viens de te faire,
Cet aveu si honteux, le crois-tu volontaire ?
Tremblante pour un fils que je n’osais trahir,
Je te venais prier de ne le point haïr.
Faibles projets d’un coeur trop plein de ce qu’il aime !
Hélas ! je ne t’ai pu parler que de toi-même.
Venge-toi, punis-moi d’un odieux amour.
Digne fils du héros qui t’a donné le jour,
Délivre l’univers d’un monstre qui t’irrite.
La veuve de Thésée ose aimer Hippolyte !
Crois-moi, ce monstre affreux ne doit point t’échapper.
Voilà mon coeur. C’est là que ta main doit frapper.
Impatient déjà d’expier son offense,
Au-devant de ton bras je le sens qui s’avance.
Frappe. Ou si tu le crois indigne de tes coups,
Si ta haine m’envie un supplice si doux,
Ou si d’un sang trop vil ta main serait trempée,
Au défaut de ton bras prête-moi ton épée.
Donne.