REVIEW: Everyman’s CANDIDA

A lobby display at Baltimore’s Everyman Theatre about playwright George Bernard Shaw says that the man was abandoned by his mother, and left to live with a father who openly despised him and whom he despised right back.  That fact informs the way men and women are portrayed in at least two of his plays, Pygmalion and Candida, the latter a pale imitation of the former.  In both, the men, under the belief that they are strong and superior, try to bend their women to their will.  The men in both end up acting like spoiled children, and the women get to have a super charged confrontation.  And in both, the women show they are strong, independent thinkers, but ultimately bend to their men’s will anyway.  What is entertaining and meaningful about this in one play (Pygmalion) is frustrating and unfulfilling in the other (Candida).  While I am in no position to be critical of one of the greatest playwrights of all time, it may unlock some of the reason why Everyman’s production of Candida is entertaining, but ultimately unfulfilling.

First of all, it must be stated plainly that Deborah Hazlett, in the title role, gives one of the best performances by a leading actress this season in the Baltimore/DC area.  She clearly understands that Candida is a woman caught in the middle, both strong in her own way, and able to placate her men.  Forceful and regal when necessary, coy and demure other times, Hazlett’s Candida (think of her as Eliza Doolittle after a few years as Henry Higgins’ wife) runs the show without ever letting her husband or would-be suitor ever know.  That tricky balance informs her every measured move or speech.  The gleam in her eye lets the audience know what is going on, and is even more delicious because her co-stars are so oblivious.  Ms. Hazlett has the cadences and attitudes implicit in interpreting a Shavian work.  The other female in the cast, Jenna Sokolowski, recent Helen Hayes award-winner for Urinetown, is also giving one of the finest supporting performances in recent memory.  As the church typist, she gets the good fortune to play a funny role that has a wonderful essence of truth to it. Sokolowski’s every move around the set - and boy, does she move – and her impeccable British accent and razor-sharp delivery make her the thing to watch whenever she makes an entrance.  Like her female co-star, she understands her role, and the demands of a Shavian piece.

Unfortunately, the men in the cast, and this might have as much to do with the directing of the piece (by the usually reliable Vincent M. Lancisi) as their apparent lack of understanding what they are doing, seem to each be in a different play.  In what is a throw-away role designed to bring a little humor and to get the ball rolling, Jason Lott as Alexander Mill isn’t very reverend-like as the seldom seen curate.  I couldn’t help but picture a fey, sexually ambiguous refugee from a Thornton Wilder play… perhaps a queer take on Cornelius Hackl from The Matchmaker (Hello, Dolly! for you show queens). (And before the email starts rolling, I imply nothing about Mr. Lott’s personal character, just his performance.)  In another small, allegedly important-to-the-plot role (functioning very similarly to Alfred Doolittle in Pygmalion, cockney accent and all, only here to represent to money-grubbing/politicking middle class with upper class aspirations) Stan Weiman makes the most out of Burgess, Candida’s visiting father.  Oddly, because everyone around him seems to be in a heightened state of reality, Weiman it seems has been directed to underplay.  The result is the funniest of the male roles, but it gets lost in the sea of hyperbole and scenery-chewing going on around him.  The play Mr. Weiman seems to be in is Charley’s Aunt or some other droll drawing room comedy.  The two central males, Reverend Morell, a preaching socialist, dominant and headstrong and Eugene Marchbanks, a young hopelessly romantic poet, scared of his own shadow, played respectively by James Denvil and Scott Kerns, represent both sides of the spectrum of men in Shavian England (much like Henry Higgins represented education and science, Morell represents religion and socialism; and like Alfred Doolittle represented the uneducated poor, Marchbanks represents art and passion). 

Unlike Pygmalion, however, Candida has all the ideas, but none come to mean anything; no real point is made beyond the idea that men, when their perceived strengths are threatened or their beliefs are questioned, behave just like small children.  That’s really it.  And Mr. Denvil and Mr. Kerns take that small point and wring it to its last meaningless drop.  It would seem that Mr. Denvil thinks his character belongs in a Shakespearean drama, and that’s SHAKESPEAREAN – every word carefully meted out, every gesture a little too large (great for the Globe, not so for the tiny Everyman).  The result is a largely unrealistic performance that offers only an occasional glimpse at why everyone around this man falls under his spell when he speaks.  But the scenery-chewer of the season award goes to Mr. Kerns, who, I think feels he is in a silent film melodrama.  Not since Norma Desmond has a character been so over the top.  With Desmond, the purpose was to instill pity for a woman clinging to a long-gone past, here the histrionics have little purpose beyond a few cheaply earned laughs and a desire on the part of the audience to slap him in the face.  Ultimately, when Candida is forced to choose (an eye-rolling plot contrivance if ever there were one) between the two, it is clear she has no real choice.  As played here, she should have told them both to hit the road.  I think the blame for these unfortunate performances lays equally among the playwright (clearly not his deepest work), the actors (many bad choices made) and the direction (rein in the actors, and have a clear vision for the piece). 

As always, Everyman has presented a highly professional production.  They have a somewhat thought-provoking work (though in ways they probably didn’t intend), fine, committed performances from some of the actors (just plain committable from others), and a technically wonderful production.  The sets, by the always-wonderful Daniel Ettinger are lovely to look at and magnificently detailed, and the costumes by Kate Turner-Walker are a visual feast.  With this Candida, the package is nicely wrapped, but the contents are half empty, not half full.

 PHOTOS:  Top: Deborah Hazlett; Bottom: Scott Kerns (L) and James Denvil (R).  Both photos by Stan Barouh.

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