Cast in order of appearance:
Flipote, Mme. Pernelle’s maid Sabina, Eve Nelson
Dorine, Mariane’s maid, Roxanne Taylor
Madame Pernelle, Orgon’s mother, Marilyn Darnall
Elmire, Orgon’s second wife, Kathleen Kusper
Damis, Orgon’s son, Rich Kropp
Mariane, Orgon’s daughter, Stephanie Abramowitz
Cléante, Orgon’s brother-in-law, Harry Hultgren
Orgon, Elmire’s husband, Craig Mahlstedt
Valère, Mariane’s suitor, Seth Evans
Tartuffe, a hypocrite, Bill Hammack
Monsieur Loyal, a bailiff, Marion J. Reis
Officer, Joel Nikoleit
Director’s Note
It seems to me very appropriate that our
production of Tartuffe is running during the same month as the Winter
Olympics in Salt Lake City. I know that our actors feel like they
have endured six weeks of “athletic comedy training” rather than
rehearsal for a farce. Comedy is hard work—and don’t let anyone
tell you otherwise. It may look easy, but it’s a strenuous routine.
This is especially true when you work on a text as vibrant and lively
as Molière’s Tartuffe.
First off, it’s a workout for the mouth and the memory. It is standard
for actors to be concerned about being heard and understood. Yet when you
work on a Molière play, you have the added challenge of lengthy sentences
written in rhyming couplets. The frenetic nature of the play’s action
demands that the text be spoken quickly. The amount of vocal dexterity and
lung power it takes to speak the lines challenges the actors’ lungs,
lips and jaws. And even though some actors find the rhyming couplets
easier to remember, those couplets can be unforgiving should memory fail.
Most actors can ad-lib natural-sounding prose; still others with a sense
of rhythm can improvise non-rhyming blank verse, as in Shakespeare. But if
your memory falters while performing Molière, you not only have to say
something that makes sense, you have to make it rhyme. Cleverly. Now, that’s
a challenge.
Then there’s the workout for the body. A number of cast members have
remarked that each rehearsal provides a day’s worth of aerobic exercise,
and I’d have to agree. Molière borrowed his comedic style from an
Italian tradition called “commedia dell’arte” which emphasized
broad, physical comedy, silly stage violence, and tricks of physical
agility. We’ve found many opportunities to use this style in our
production. You’re going to see actors crawling, running, leaping,
wrestling, and throwing each other around tonight. The table scene (you’ll
know it when you see it) may appear to be a fun, lusty romp over and
around a table. In reality, it’s a long, choreographed routine of
precision moves and stage combat more akin to Olympic pair figure-skating
than acting. Finally, there’s the workout for the actors’
sensibilities. It’s not enough to speak in rhyming couplets and perform
athletic moves—they need to make it seem natural to the character. In
the midst of rhyming like they really mean it, they have to interact with
passion and real need. This last challenge has stretched us all, and only
you, our audience, can decide if we pull off this final undertaking.
I believe that if curling is an Olympic sport, acting in a Molière comedy
should certainly gain the same status some day. With that said, sit back,
relax, and let the games begin!
About the Play
Tartuffe was first performed at the palace of Versailles in 1664 and
was immediately banned. The King had delighted in the satire, but
powerful members of the Catholic Church in France were outraged. To
underscore the true target of the play, Molière changed the title
to The Hypocrite, but even that did not appease his detractors.
Scandal makes for good box office, and as a result, the French
nobility were anxious to see the play; Molière performed numerous
readings of Tartuffe in private homes. Soon he was called before the
papal legate to read the script. Happily, the legate believed that
the play mocked the Jansenists (an extreme right wing of the
Church), while the Jansenists in turn believed that the play
portrayed the loose morals of the left wing of the Church. Thus,
thanks to the reality that we can easily see the foolishness of
others but not our own, Tartuffe returned to the stage for good.
About the Author
Jean-Baptiste Poquelin was born in Paris in 1622, and his
upbringing was thoroughly bourgeois. His father’s royal
appointment as “Bourgeois de Paris” (“middle-class guy”,
more or less) was earned by selling bedding to the nobility. By the
time Jean-Baptiste was 22, he’d quit law school, taken up with an
actress(!), started a theatre, achieved bankruptcy, and changed his
name to Molière, thus becoming the most bourgeois of bourgeois sons—a
bohemian dropout. Molière’s initial venture into theatre was so
financially and artistically disastrous that he fled Paris. He spent
the next thirteen years touring the provinces, where he learned his
craft as actor, director, and writer. He was especially influenced
by the farcical style of Italy’s commedia dell’arte. When his
company finally returned to Paris, they performed Molière’s
biting, up-to-the-minute social farces in a broadly physical style.
Parisian audiences flocked to the performances, and Molière began
to seek approval from courtly circles. The King’s brother became
Molière’s patron. In 1661, Molière wrote the first of his major
plays, The School for Husbands, which revealed his skill with light
rhymes rather than the heavy, image-laden poetry of his
contemporaries. It also revealed the theme that would inspire the
rest of his plays—middle class obsession. He wrote of obsession
with money in The Miser; with health in The Doctor in Spite of
Himself; with manners in The Bourgeois Gentleman. With Tartuffe,
written in 1664, Molière took aim at “obsessive religion” (in
contrast to what he termed “true religion”), and suddenly the
author needed all of the protection that his new patron, King Louis
XIV, could provide. For the next nine years, Molière was embroiled
in bitter battles with the Church.
On February 17, 1673, while performing in The Imaginary Invalid, Molière
was stricken with a coughing fit and collapsed. He died later that
night. His wife was forced to beg Louis XIV to intercede with the
Archbishop of Paris so that Molière could be properly buried, a right
actors forfeited by their choice of profession. |
Setting: Orgon’s house in modern-day Paris, France (if
modern day French people spoke in rhyming couplets and France retained a
functional monarchy).
Production Credits
Director, Tony Vezner
Stage Manager, Liz Egan
Assistant Stage Manager, Charlie Egan
Costume Designer, Beth Hubbartt
Costume Crew, Karen Babcock, Kim Hurley, Andrea Imes, Mary O’Dowd,
Patricia Rafferty, Carolyn Redding, Jane Stacy, Dorothy Tressler, Marilyn
Weiher
Dramaturg, Carol Dapogny
Lighting Designers, Dick Jacoby, Peg Jacoby
Lighting Crew, Jon Mills, Paul Roach,
Stephanie Rychlowski, Cal Turner
Makeup Designer, Ginny Richardson
Makeup Crew, Merrilyn Tomchaney, Sara Torrey
Properties Designers,Carin Klock, Susan Kosiarek
Properties Crew, Bryon Abramowitz, Bonnie Hilton, Jan Mahlstedt,
Stephanie Robey, Julie Suarez
Set Designer, Tom Squillo
Set Construction Chair,Tom Squillo
Set Construction Crew, Mark Favoino, Tim Feeney, Tom Frohnapfel,
Michael Huth, Heinz Karplus, Mike Pavia, Bill Redding, Bill Rotz
Set Painting Chair, Bill Rotz
Set Painting Crew, John Allen, Ralph Byers, Carol Clarke, Art Kelly,
Sandra Lulay, Susan Remy, Pat Rotz, Fred Sauers, Sandy Squillo
Sound Designer, Martha Hogenboom
Sound Crew, Hedy Bosch
Technical Director, Shelley Dotson
Production Box Office Chair, Sandy Squillo
Production Box Office Crew, Peg Callaghan, George Dempsey, Jill Neely,
Lori B. Proksa, Patti Roeder, Mary Ellen Schutt, Virginia Swinnen
Production Coordinator, Carol Dapogny
Production Group Sales Chair, Carol Clarke
Production Hospitality Crew, Catherine Bloomer, Linda Bremer, Brian
Centers, Mark Cunningham, Judy DiVita, Pauline Gamble, Jon Genson,
Jennifer Jindrich, Karin Kramer, Caitlin Machak, Lisa Machak, Nikita
Machak, Joanne Patten, Jim Patten, Lauren Patten, Nora Patten, Rob Snyder,
Gregg Valek, Lenka Valek, Stephanie Williams
Production House Managers, Jack Calvert, Susan Cardamone, Joe Delaloye,
Jim Dutton, Mike Mallon, Kevin McGrath, Jon Mills, Tom Schutt, Bill
Wilson, Denny Wise
Production Lobby Photo Display, Marge Heffernan, Jane Stacy
Production Posters, Kathleen Kusper
Production Program Chair, Mary Maureen Gentile
Production Program Design, John Vilhauer
Production Publicity Chair, Linda Auer
Artistic Director, Tony Vezner
Marketing and Managing Director, Jeffrey P. Arena
About the Translator
Richard Wilbur, Pulitzer Prize winner for Things of this World
(1956) and the second United States Poet Laureate, was born in New
York City on March 1, 1921. As a translator, he strives for the
same easy style he demonstrates in his original works. He has translated
Don Juan, The Imaginary Cuckold, The Misanthrope, and other plays
by Molière, as well as Andromache and Phaedra, both by Racine.
Acknowledgments:
Produced by special arrangement with Dramatists Play Service,
Inc.
Special Thanks:
Philippe Parker, of site-moliere.com, provided practical,
historical and scholarly advice.
Charron and Dick Traut generously loaned the Theatre the
chandelier used in the production.
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