Travesties
Roundabout Theatre Company
American Airlines Theatre
April 5, 2018
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| Photo courtesy of Roundabout Theatre Company |
Tom
Stoppard’s Travesties is receiving a tremendous revival by Roundabout Theatre Company. Director Patrick Marber is in sync with Mr.
Stoppard’s rhythms and humor. The cast
magnificently delivers the bite in the sarcasm and the punch in the irony. The political and social commentary is clear
and relevant, and makes an even more impressive statement when you realize it
was first performed in 1974.
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| Tom Hollander as Henry Carr Photo courtesy of Roundabout Theatre Company |
Henry
Carr (played by Tom Hollander) pieces together the stories from his younger
days in 1918 after the war in Zurich, Switzerland. First there was his acquaintance with Tristan
Tzara (played by Seth Numrich), the Romanian radical free thinker who helped
find the Dada movement. Next was the
meeting with James Joyce (played by Peter McDonald), while he was writing Ulysses.
Then there was his run-ins with Lenin (played by Dan Butler) at the
local library. The discourse over
revolution, socialism, art for art’s sake, and art for social commentary
commands the air when these characters collide.
The comedy rises when Gwendolyn (played by Scarlett Strallen) and Cecily
(played by Sara Topham) mistake the identities of Henry and Tristan. This parallels the plot of Oscar Wilde’s The Importance
of Being Ernest,
a play in which James Joyce convinces Henry to star in.
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| Tom Hollander, Dan Butler, Patrick Kerr, Seth Numrich, & Patrick Marber Photo courtesy of Walter McBride, Broadway World, & Roundabout Theatre Company |
Tom
Hollander and Seth Numrich are mesmerizing as Henry Carr and Tristan Tzara. Peter McDonald and Dan Butler boldly embody
the characters of James Joyce and Lenin.
Patrick Kerr is underplayed perfection as Bennet, Henry Carr’s
butler. The entire cast works as a tight
ensemble. Their timing is
impeccable. Their physicalities are
broad and energetic. They bring light to
Mr. Stoppard’s strong statements about art and humanity, which ring truthfully
and vigorously.
The
set design by Tim Hatley is full of surprises, allowing for numerous exit and
entrance points and a wide variety of levels.
Lighting by Neil Austin is crisp and succinct, and greatly enhances the
timing of the humor and the enthusiasm of the absurdity.
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| Photo courtesy of Roundabout Theatre Company |
From
the Roundabout Theatre Company program notes:
“A travesty is a ‘debased, distorted, or grossly inferior imitation’ of
something; can also be defined as an artistic imitation of something in a
ridiculously inappropriate style; Travesties
is a travesty of The Importance of Being
Ernest and other literary sources; characters in Travesties are travesties of the real people they are based on.” This production sharply focuses on these four
statements, bringing valuable insight to the purpose of art and how our
involvement in it makes us human
Travesties is running at
the American Airlines Theatre through June 17.
Domenick Danza
