I Would Do Anything, Anything For New Drive At The TfN!
Triumph Of Love - Stadttheater Hildesheim, 07/12/2013
Some facts:
It was 1732 when French playwright Pierre Carlet de Chamblain de Marivaux published his commedia dell'arte play Le Triomphe de l'Amour but was received poorly by the critics and apparently closed after just six performances.
261 years later book writer James Magruder presents a non musical translation, brought on stage and seen by composer Jeffrey Stock in New York the year after who was then inspired to bring this play as a musical on stage.
The result was the musical "Triumph Of Love" which opened on Broadway in October 1997 with mixed reviews only to close again after just 30 previews and 85 performances in January 1998 due to poor ticket sales.
And nearly 16 years after its closure the TfN musical company brought this show, hardly seen in theatres these days, on stage.
Director, Costumes and Stage/Set Design - Uwe Schwarz
Musical Director - Andreas Unsicker
Choreography - Katja Buhl
Cast:
Princess Leonide - Magdalene Orzol
Agis - Tim Müller
Hesione - Michaela Linck
Hermocrates - Jens Krause
Harlequin - Alexander Prosek
Dimas - Jonas Hein
Corine - Caroline Zins
The story, usually set in a topiary labyrinth, revolves around Spartan princess Leonide who falls head over heels for the student Agis after just one glimpse.
To complicate things her throne was wrongfully gained by her family from Agis's family but she does not know that yet.
Agis has been raised by his uncle Hermocrates and his aunt Hesione, both stern apparent rather emotionless and hyper-rationalistic philosophers, and who has been very much in training for the day, which surprisingly is the day Leonide spots Agis, when he intends to dethrone (and worse as kill) the princess.
Realising that women are not welcome at the house but as she is determined to win Agis' affection Leonide enters the garden with her maid Corine in male disguise and befriends Agis who quickly confides in him, err her about his plans to kill his arch enemy etc.
Further complications occur when Hermocrates and Hesione learn of the intruder with the result that all three, Agis, Hesione and Hermocrates, fall in love with Leonide who is always a different person with further disguises and massive lies are told.
Eventually things are sorted out with also some help from the maid Corine and the Spartan servant Harlequin and gardener Dimas. Leonide is forgiven her lies and they live happily ever after "ruled by mind and tempered by heart".
For a full synopsis read >>here on the MTI page.
So far so good, I have never read the original, my French is pretty much non existent (the pleasure of having Latin at school), but apparently Magruder stuck to the mavivaudage of the original with all the plot mechanism of disguises, manipulation and deceptions Marivaux lent from the commedia dell'arte though more vulgarised and adulterated and even adding more plot complications though Magruder alsobonce said that only 20% of his translation survived the transition being replaced by the songs with lyrics from Susan Birkenhead.
I had never seen the show live before. I was just familiar with the OBC with the incredible Betty Buckley as Hesione and the adorable Susan Egan as Leonide and the odd audio and video bootleg.
I had never seen the show live before. I was just familiar with the OBC with the incredible Betty Buckley as Hesione and the adorable Susan Egan as Leonide and the odd audio and video bootleg.
So from what I knew about the piece is and what it turned out to be when seeing it live it itself is enjoyable and amusing, but characteristics are rather flat and the wordplays which trend towards naughty and vulgar puns seem forced.
The amount of slapstick is high and rather real elaborated emotions are rare. The constant deliberate push and pull between elevated wit and below the belt jokes wears off quickly and too often the piece idles especially with the additional plot of the servants Corine, Harlequin and Dimas which are just blown up accessories wasting a chance of story telling but focusing way too much on the stock character formulation.
The message of the story comes across decently though even if it occasionally gets too much constantly being hit with a sledgehammer and am sure everyone in the audience got it that it really is love at the end that triumphs being a mind and heart combination but not without its accompanying disappointments.
And so James Magruder said in an interview "Love is delightful and love is cruel, leaving victors and victims in its wake. Marivaux honours both extremes in his wonderful play."
Well, the wonderful is for me debatable but the key of the show is love and love and LOVE and what people go through in life for it.
Unfortunately for Uwe Schwarz it is not. For him it seems to be the idea of self discovery as already apparent in his set from the beginning.
But (re-)discovering love, dealing with problems coming along with it is not automatically going hand in hand with self discovery and here the characters largely just react than act but act would be essential to discover.
Michael Mayer, the director of the original production, said "the lesson of this musical... [is] the battle of head vs. heart. Maybe what the musical is saying is you cannot rule with one or the other. The mind needs to be tempered by passion, and passion without logic and reason and discipline can cause as much damage."
I totally agree with Mayer as the story is telling me that but again what is shown on stage does not match that.
Set is largely a yellow platform with two trapdoors and holes in which poles can be plugged in so that regularly new pictures can be created. Regularly? For me it sometimes felt like constantly. Then there were the odd other prop as a water fountain, a bonsai tree, a hammock and some other items you might find in a garden. And then there was the screen wall at the back regularly showing various kinds of mazes and some bright lighting.
In the programme (for free, well included in ticket price, at that theatre, so it is not that you had to splash out money to learn about it) it says more or less the following:
The labyrinth has been around since the ancient days and in all cultures places of (self) discovery and are (as in mazes) places of confusion...
The way into the centre of a labyrinth is comparable with the look into the inner self. Everyone carries their own catastrophes around which influence relationships. No one goes straight forward and unbroken their way. Therefore the labyrinth is to figure the psychology of the Marivaux figures.
Set is largely a yellow platform with two trapdoors and holes in which poles can be plugged in so that regularly new pictures can be created. Regularly? For me it sometimes felt like constantly. Then there were the odd other prop as a water fountain, a bonsai tree, a hammock and some other items you might find in a garden. And then there was the screen wall at the back regularly showing various kinds of mazes and some bright lighting.In the programme (for free, well included in ticket price, at that theatre, so it is not that you had to splash out money to learn about it) it says more or less the following:
The labyrinth has been around since the ancient days and in all cultures places of (self) discovery and are (as in mazes) places of confusion...
The way into the centre of a labyrinth is comparable with the look into the inner self. Everyone carries their own catastrophes around which influence relationships. No one goes straight forward and unbroken their way. Therefore the labyrinth is to figure the psychology of the Marivaux figures.
And this is where it goes further wrong for me.
First of all the common understanding among scholars is these days that mazes are not a special form of labyrinth. The common definition of a labyrinth is that it is usually a single through-route with twists and turns without branches while a maze is one with many branches, dead ends and choices of path.
I know you find some other definitions by other scholars around but the majority clearly agrees that a labyrinth and a maze are not the same off same base and I agree. The approach for each is a complete different.
Also to say in a programme that the labyrinth is THAT what I just wrote very much as a fact is an absolute no go. What is written in it is an opinion, if you research what a labyrinth is you get dozens of definitions and since they have been around for so many centuries no one can know for sure what the real meaning is of them - whatever they are used for these days and since (for more info read e.g. >>here)
But being told and shown labyrinths and constantly mixing with mazes just proved for me that the director did not really deal with that subject.
It seems he read the synopsis as on the MTI website (same as in CD booklet so official synopsis) where it says that the story is set "in an elaborate, 18th-Century, Greco-French topiary labyrinth of Sparta" and just saw the word labyrinth and got that great instant idea of just taking the word labyrinth way too literal but without realising mixing labyrinths with mazes.
Other people praised the set for the creativity, for me it was just wrong and it doesn't serve the show which is what I want to see even if for the right show it might have looked decent even if having the typical director's signature already seen and disliked in the TfN's production of Sweeney Todd mishmashing all kind of elements as also the absurd costumes.
Other people praised the set for the creativity, for me it was just wrong and it doesn't serve the show which is what I want to see even if for the right show it might have looked decent even if having the typical director's signature already seen and disliked in the TfN's production of Sweeney Todd mishmashing all kind of elements as also the absurd costumes.
Cartoonish costumes I could have lived with as it would follow the original commedia dell'arte idea but a total blow is just ridiculous.
Yes, some people may argue the subject relates to all kind of periods but this is just simply the director's style and that totally misses the point of an individual concept for a show.
The pace is also too often anything but fast with annoying set changes usually done by the cast themselves with changes sometimes taking longer than the actual scene.The casting of the show also displays again the difficulty of a permanent ensemble as the Musical Company just not having largely the exactly right people for the show needed unlike a show that would properly cast from a much bigger selection.
Magdalene Orzol as the princess Leonide can certainly sing the songs with decent empathy but lacks distinct varied personality to each of the princess' dusguises. Yes they shall not to be too defined imo but here the nuances are so little showing so little difference in behaviour and especially in voice.
But what she was way too much for me was relentlessly enthusiastic with way too much emotional excess to be likeable so needed as let's face it, Leonide is a bitch. Yes, she is. No discussion for me.
She deliberately breaks the heart of two decent people so she can get what she wants. Even when she sings near the end about what she has done I do not believe that she really has changed so at least I would want to see deep sincere love that excuses her behaviour to a certain degree as, am sure, pretty much everyone has done something that hurt others but for which someone did not see an alternative.
There is also not enough, actually very little chemistry between her and Tim Müller as Agis who comes across with little charm and when Agis confesses that he is in love with Leonide (in disguise) it comes pretty much out of the blue as just not shown in his play.
Agis is the character with the biggest development, not (!) self discovery, but his demeanour hardly develops.
He gets confused, torn between philosophic principles and his first taste of what love is but Tim is again not showing that in his performance that it is also very hard for me to understand why a strong headed girl as Leonide would fall in love with someone as him.
Caroline Zins as the wise cracking, sexually knowing brassy maid is unfortunately sounding way too coarse and just simply loud and shrill to have any kind of appeal but be a turn off.
Her counterparts Alexander Prosek and Jonas Hein as Harlequin and Dimas respectively can also not excel as farceurs.
Yes they make you laugh at the beginning but it quickly wears off with the too many exaggerations and another and another...
Yes book can be blamed but also their presentation shows limited flexibility especially Harlequin.
It also does not help that Harlequin is more a cheap(est) version of Hardy of Laurel and Hardy than a Harlequin totally missing the archetypal potentials and characteristics.
So it is again the long-established members of the musical company that do the show proud.
Jens Krause as Hermocrates may look like Albert Einstein (why???) but makes the part his own commanding the stage with his austere and somber performance first and then becoming so dignified and even giddy when falling under Leonide's spell.
Especially in his duet with Michaela Linck "The Tree" when he can really show off touching humbled quietness as both sing quietly to/with each other while meditating in front of a stunted bonsai tree and watching Hermocrates and also Hesione is heartbreaking.
The audience knows they have been tricked, they don't and to see how they walk the path until learning the truth is just moving.
The characterisation of the spinster aunt Hesione is most probably the most interesting and colourful one since the part, originally significantly smaller in the tryout runs, for the Broadway run to accomodate the casting of Betty Buckley extended as it ranges from apparent frigid puritanical stiff- and sternness to vulnearable yearning despair to funny absurd and hyped up hope.
Already in the opening number Michaela Linck brings in the right amount of dour panache and develops wonderfully with touching credibility and potent vocal richness and calibration but the odd show of nerves.
Her rendition of "Serenity" is full of heart melting fragility and with every line she sings you just feel watching a real lonely middle-aged woman yearning for returned love at last.
And as much as for Hermocrates I just feel hurt to watch how she is being disillusioned, lied to with such a disgrace and how she deals with it eventually.
There was a reason why they chose that life in rather isolated remoteness, one I can actually refer to from personal experience.
No one wants to be lied to, betrayed even though it still happens too often, more and more often actually imo, honesty has become a rarity, people lying regularly to get something out of it but still get through with it even when caught with no consequences as the victim usually does not have the courage to approach the liar.
I am different these days, I brace the person. Not always liked but I do that for my own sanity.
Funny to see are the reactions as usually they pretend innocence but having been hurt too often in all kind of subjects including love matters or my job as a controller with one of my main tasks is reviewing processes and these are usually laid out and executed by people (suppose though shall be glad I do not work in the entertainment business (anymore) recalling the amount of falseness I witnessed there and still do from the outside) I do not tolerate lying (NOT talking about white lies! ).
So to see a show in which such a subject is handled with such an ease makes me wonder whether a directing approach where the focus is on that level might work. Maybe next time...
The music itself reminds massively of well known other songs, not automatically a bad thing, with references to various musical styles. Why some people though said that most Sondheim fans may resonate to it I do not know.
I am a Sondheim fan, no I am a Sondheim freak, and this music is in a different lower league than Sondheim is. If Sondheim is premier league, this is regional league. Yes, there are some nice melodies, not really catching, but songs as "Serenity" or "The Tree" are certainly haunting and manage to to catch the subtle moments.
But when you have the orchestra reduced by several people but the score not rearranged properly losing the finesse and detailedness of it the sound experience is one not wanted.
Andreas Unsicker clearly seems to not have dealt properly with the score as for me it largely lives of the brigo which it with missing especially the essential percussion massively.
Also a let down is the choreography. Sure there are no big dance numbers, you would not expect them in such a chamber musical the chances which are there are just totally wasted.
Do these morning programmes on regional TV in Germany still exist where some easy fitness regimes are shown? I always thought they existed mainly for pensioners and housewives and the choreography seen here are more looking like that than anything else. I was also wondering whether Katja Buhl even seen a proper pole dance? To wobble with hips a bit is obviously enough for her that the stock character Harlequin and Dimas fall for maid Corine.
Well if anyone is still in need for a belated Christmas present a voucher for a pole dance course might be an idea!
So overall a production let down by director Uwe Schwarz who again choses against a production that supports the show but for the craving of prestige and his own sake doing things differently.
And when casting can largely not satisfy as just not having the right people for most parts makes me question how the musical company works.
Either I do shows to accomodate the cast or I pick the cast to accomodate the shows selected as repertory.
With a permanent ensemble it may not work all the time but it currently seems not much thought is put into casting.
They just announced casting of La Cage Aux Folles proves that when people already by characterisation are just wrong and I largely have the impression that a lot happens by bootlicking having also witnessed certain things since Katja Buhl took over the director job (uh, did I really just write that? Yes I did and I stand by it).
How else would some people regularly cast with parts way too big for their skill set?
I fear already for La Cage Aux Folles as I totally adore this piece having seen it so often especially the stunning London Playhouse one a few years ago.
Triumph Of Love is worth a visit to see Jens Krause and Michaela Linck alone but beyond that I have seen more love and less trifle in amateur productions.
