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Reinvented ‘La Mancha’ takes on greater meaning
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Reviewed by: FRAN HELLER Contributing Writer
The 1960s in America was, to borrow a phrase from Alan Greenspan’s new memoir, an “age of turbulence.”
The war in Vietnam was escalating, and on the domestic front, there was violence and looting in the nation’s cities.
Against this backdrop, “Man of La Mancha” was born, the 1965 high-voltage musical about the importance of ideals and the quest for a better world. Created by three Jewish men n Dale Wasserman (book), Mitch Leigh (music), and Joe Darion (lyrics) n the musical was boldly innovative in its soaring lyricism, penetrating intelligence, and unsparing violence.
Fast-forward to 2007 with a new era of turbulence and yet another war. Against the current political climate, director Amanda Dehnert has fashioned an adaptation of “La Mancha” that reflects the lunacy of these times. It’s at The Cleveland Play House through Oct. 7.
Stripped of spectacle and performed in the intimate surroundings of the Drury Theatre, the play takes on even greater meaning and a heightened sense of urgency.
The setting is a 16th-century Spanish prison, where poet, playwright, actor and tax collector Miguel de Cervantes and his manservant have just been incarcerated for “crimes” against the church. As Cervantes awaits his fate, he is placed on trial by the other inmates.
The trial is the “play-within-the-play” and the story of Don Quixote, a knight errant who sets out to right the world’s wrongs. But Quixote lives in a world of illusion and cannot distinguish between reality and fantasy. When forced to recognize his illusory world, the reality destroys him.
Wasserman initially wrote the play for television. Turning Cervantes’s classic into a musical proved a smashing success, sweeping the 1966 Tony Awards, including Best Musical and Best Original Score.
Like director Dehnert’s take on “My Fair Lady” last season, I have mixed emotions about tampering with the original. True, there are some great moments in the director’s 100-minute streamlined production, revealing a truly fertile imagination at play. But the truncated storyline feels mangled, some of the humor borders on tastelessness, and the feel-good “Les Miz”-type finale is tacky.
That said, the music is glorious, and when the phenomenal Philip Hernández as the Don sings “The Impossible Dream,” all is forgiven. The hit song drew thunderous applause, and rightly so.
Kris Stone’s stark dungeon setting is bathed in total blackness except for a stream of light emanating from an overhead grille far above the prison vault. Lap Chi Chu’s lighting does some amazing tricks. Piles of skulls and bones emit a sense of the comic and the macabre.
The idea of madness gets heavy play. When Cervantes first appears, he is talking to a skull, like a page from “Hamlet.” Aldonza, the scullery maid who becomes the lady Dulcinea in Quixote’s eyes, has the crazed look and mien of a madwoman.
Cervantes has been charged with being an “idealist, a bad poet and an honest man,” to which he pleads guilty. Forced to defend himself, he reads his story to his fellow prisoners, whereby he is transformed into Don Quixote in the titular song “Man of La Mancha.”
From first to last, Hernández as the gentle, slightly addled Quixote and Jamie La Verdiere as his devoted manservant Sancho Panza own the limelight. Their friendship is beautifully captured by these consummate performers, who sing and act with equal brio.
Rachel Warren knows how to deliver a song, but she has vocal trouble at the highest registers, and her largely one-note performance as the vulgar wench Aldonza borders on the shrill. Furthermore, Aldonza’s catatonic behavior turned me off. I also found the sadistic rape scene almost too shocking.
Villain of the piece is the cruel Dr. Carrasco (Patrick Porter), a man of science who forces Quixote to face the truth about himself. Ana Kuzmanic’s costume design and James C. Swonger’s sound amplification turn the doctor into Darth Vader.
Chris McBurney is quite good as the sympathetic Padre, who understands that the scientist’s cure is worse than the disease. Daniel C. Levine’s cross-dressing as the Housekeeper converts the comic song “I’m Only Thinking of Him” into boorish camp.
With instrumentalists strategically placed at different levels in the theater, the music wafts through the air under Bill Corcoran’s sparkling direction.
The audience loved the show. Chances are you will, too. As for me, I became a reluctant convert.
The 1960s in America was, to borrow a phrase from Alan Greenspan’s new memoir, an “age of turbulence.”
The war in Vietnam was escalating, and on the domestic front, there was violence and looting in the nation’s cities.
Against this backdrop, “Man of La Mancha” was born, the 1965 high-voltage musical about the importance of ideals and the quest for a better world. Created by three Jewish men n Dale Wasserman (book), Mitch Leigh (music), and Joe Darion (lyrics) n the musical was boldly innovative in its soaring lyricism, penetrating intelligence, and unsparing violence.
Fast-forward to 2007 with a new era of turbulence and yet another war. Against the current political climate, director Amanda Dehnert has fashioned an adaptation of “La Mancha” that reflects the lunacy of these times. It’s at The Cleveland Play House through Oct. 7.
Stripped of spectacle and performed in the intimate surroundings of the Drury Theatre, the play takes on even greater meaning and a heightened sense of urgency.
The setting is a 16th-century Spanish prison, where poet, playwright, actor and tax collector Miguel de Cervantes and his manservant have just been incarcerated for “crimes” against the church. As Cervantes awaits his fate, he is placed on trial by the other inmates.
The trial is the “play-within-the-play” and the story of Don Quixote, a knight errant who sets out to right the world’s wrongs. But Quixote lives in a world of illusion and cannot distinguish between reality and fantasy. When forced to recognize his illusory world, the reality destroys him.
Wasserman initially wrote the play for television. Turning Cervantes’s classic into a musical proved a smashing success, sweeping the 1966 Tony Awards, including Best Musical and Best Original Score.
Like director Dehnert’s take on “My Fair Lady” last season, I have mixed emotions about tampering with the original. True, there are some great moments in the director’s 100-minute streamlined production, revealing a truly fertile imagination at play. But the truncated storyline feels mangled, some of the humor borders on tastelessness, and the feel-good “Les Miz”-type finale is tacky.
That said, the music is glorious, and when the phenomenal Philip Hernández as the Don sings “The Impossible Dream,” all is forgiven. The hit song drew thunderous applause, and rightly so.
Kris Stone’s stark dungeon setting is bathed in total blackness except for a stream of light emanating from an overhead grille far above the prison vault. Lap Chi Chu’s lighting does some amazing tricks. Piles of skulls and bones emit a sense of the comic and the macabre.
The idea of madness gets heavy play. When Cervantes first appears, he is talking to a skull, like a page from “Hamlet.” Aldonza, the scullery maid who becomes the lady Dulcinea in Quixote’s eyes, has the crazed look and mien of a madwoman.
Cervantes has been charged with being an “idealist, a bad poet and an honest man,” to which he pleads guilty. Forced to defend himself, he reads his story to his fellow prisoners, whereby he is transformed into Don Quixote in the titular song “Man of La Mancha.”
From first to last, Hernández as the gentle, slightly addled Quixote and Jamie La Verdiere as his devoted manservant Sancho Panza own the limelight. Their friendship is beautifully captured by these consummate performers, who sing and act with equal brio.
Rachel Warren knows how to deliver a song, but she has vocal trouble at the highest registers, and her largely one-note performance as the vulgar wench Aldonza borders on the shrill. Furthermore, Aldonza’s catatonic behavior turned me off. I also found the sadistic rape scene almost too shocking.
Villain of the piece is the cruel Dr. Carrasco (Patrick Porter), a man of science who forces Quixote to face the truth about himself. Ana Kuzmanic’s costume design and James C. Swonger’s sound amplification turn the doctor into Darth Vader.
Chris McBurney is quite good as the sympathetic Padre, who understands that the scientist’s cure is worse than the disease. Daniel C. Levine’s cross-dressing as the Housekeeper converts the comic song “I’m Only Thinking of Him” into boorish camp.
With instrumentalists strategically placed at different levels in the theater, the music wafts through the air under Bill Corcoran’s sparkling direction.
The audience loved the show. Chances are you will, too. As for me, I became a reluctant convert.
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