{"id":1778,"date":"2017-04-26T14:26:26","date_gmt":"2017-04-26T12:26:26","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/thecritter.co.za\/?p=1778"},"modified":"2017-04-26T14:26:26","modified_gmt":"2017-04-26T12:26:26","slug":"tartuffe-in-rhyme","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thecritter.co.za\/?p=1778","title":{"rendered":"Tartuffe: (Version two) A heresy in rhyme"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a>
Khutjo Green and Craig Morris in Tartuffe, currently showing at the Baxter.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Hypocrites, we can see them everywhere.<\/p>\n

Nowdays, mostly in the political sphere.<\/p>\n

For that is where power now sits.<\/p>\n

A president surrounded by shits.<\/p>\n

They pronounce before symbols of integrity and courage and fortitude,<\/p>\n

promising all we perceive to be good in this world; jobs, land, security, food.<\/p>\n

Yet in the delivery of these hopes, they display an inordinate lassitude.<\/p>\n

For although they said \u2018we\u2019<\/p>\n

They really meant \u2018me\u2019.<\/p>\n

An upside-down dyslexic lisp<\/p>\n

accompanied by denials that are crisp.<\/p>\n

Today\u2019s elevating cross lies on its side, on a ballot paper,<\/p>\n

but when Moli\u00e8<\/span>re wrote Tartuffe, it was before an upright cross hypocrites did caper.<\/p>\n

That crucifix is no longer imposed on us,<\/p>\n

modernism has provided more intellectual suss.<\/p>\n

Our little x\u2019s are what now fuels the gravy train,<\/p>\n

upon which hypocricy remains a common bane.<\/p>\n

So although the church may have lost its power,<\/p>\n

Sylvaine Strike reveals that Moli\u00e8<\/span>re has not gone sour.<\/p>\n

Enabling this play to arc across the centuries,<\/p>\n

her deft control and sensitivities<\/p>\n

brings the characters to the fore,<\/p>\n

where in lesser hands they could be lost in a time of yore.<\/p>\n

Eschewing notions of \u2018reimagining\u2019 which have been the death knell<\/p>\n

for innumerable \u2018updated\u2019 Shakespeare versions which fell<\/p>\n

upon their recontextualised notion,<\/p>\n

performance is her simple potion.<\/p>\n

An inspired choice to bring text to life through physicality<\/p>\n

which she has all actors perform with alacrity.<\/p>\n

In Moli\u00e8<\/span>re\u2019s text of wonderfully translated rhyming couplets<\/p>\n

she does away with dressing her characters in doublets,<\/p>\n

creating instead a play of marvelous movement that resembles an absurd ballet<\/p>\n

that I\u2019m sure would raise an audience to its feet in Calais.<\/p>\n

A dance of gestures<\/p>\n

performed in 1920s vestures.<\/p>\n

She is a physical theatre acolyte,<\/p>\n

a ploy she wields to give this play its bite.<\/p>\n

Neil McCarthy as wealthy patriarch Orgon<\/p>\n

is superbly cast as the simple-minded moron<\/p>\n

who is fooled by the hyprocrite Tartuffe<\/p>\n

of whose piety he demands no proof.<\/p>\n

In this role Craig Morris is a delight,<\/p>\n

seeing him enter made my night.<\/p>\n

Bowing and scraping and swooping so low as to sweep the floor with his nose<\/p>\n

beside ludicrously long-legged McCarthy they were a pair perfectly chose.<\/p>\n

Morris\u2019s malevolent simian physicality<\/p>\n

and low centre of gravity,<\/p>\n

foil to McCarthy\u2019s precarious list,<\/p>\n

itself providing visual cue to his downfall that could hardly be missed.<\/p>\n

Not that Camilla Waldman as Orgon\u2019s sister (originally the brother),<\/p>\n

or radiant Khutjo Green as the mother<\/p>\n

were any less impressive.<\/p>\n

Vanessa Cooke as the belligerent servant was most expressive,<\/p>\n

Vuyelwa Maluleke as Orgon\u2019s daughter<\/p>\n

was as beautiful to watch as she ought to.<\/p>\n

Anele Situlweni as her suitor<\/p>\n

was no less cuter<\/p>\n

and as Orgon\u2019s son, Adrian Alper wielded that umbrella<\/p>\n

like a justifiably outraged fella.<\/p>\n

William Harding\u2019s cameo parts<\/p>\n

showed he can reach beyond a writers\u2019 arts.<\/p>\n

In all each part was so wonderfully cast,<\/p>\n

there was no sense this was a play from the past.<\/p>\n

All this is acted upon a terrace flanked by billowing pink organza<\/p>\n

the design reminscent of a meditteranean extravaganza.<\/p>\n

This design was executed by Sasha Ehlers and Chen Naker<\/p>\n

who used the fleur de lis in a way that was quite lekker.<\/p>\n

Nakar\u2019s costuming provides an air more Great Gatsby than Louis XIV<\/p>\n

but had the set been placed in that era of courting<\/p>\n

we would have been watching a period piece,<\/p>\n

and Strike would\u2019ve had to cast Emma Thompson, or her thespian niece.<\/p>\n

It would be remiss not to congratulate Oliver Hauser on his lighting,<\/p>\n

which provided crucial moments with the requisitely delicate brightening.<\/p>\n

Strike, who actors respectfully say is exacting,<\/p>\n

has a reputation for enacting<\/p>\n

work that deserves congratulation<\/p>\n

by means of a standing ovation.<\/p>\n

Her discipline is wielded to weave among actors and crew the feeling<\/p>\n

of having achieved beyond what they believed was their ceiling.<\/p>\n

It is a touch so deftly definitive that without so much as a nod or even a glance,<\/p>\n

her work can produce ruminations that some may look upon askance.<\/p>\n

That hairshirts might still be a thing (my black pain)<\/p>\n

and self-flagellation a common tool (my white stain)<\/p>\n

Or is this too much a heresy<\/p>\n

for one whose rhyming is so riddled with errancy?<\/p>\n

Tartuffe is on at the Baxter Flipside theatre until April 29, thereafter it travels to that city that’s essentially a mine.<\/em><\/p>\n

— Steve Kretzmann<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Hypocrites, we can see them everywhere. Nowdays, mostly in the political sphere. For that is where power now sits. A president surrounded by shits. They pronounce before symbols of integrity … Read More<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1781,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mi_skip_tracking":false},"categories":[10,11],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thecritter.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1778"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thecritter.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thecritter.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thecritter.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thecritter.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1778"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/thecritter.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1778\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thecritter.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/1781"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thecritter.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1778"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thecritter.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1778"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thecritter.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1778"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}