Return to AARO
"A Flea in Her Ear" is one of the best known of the classic French farces. Written by George Feydeau in the 18th century, the play has the usual assortment of misconstrued intentions, wild misinterpretations, mistaken identities, raised stakes and doors for the slamming. This adaptation by Barnett Shaw brings the action from the landed gentry of the early 1700's to the rich Parisian businessmen at the tail end of the 1800's. The resulting script, which is very long (running, with two intermissions, until after 10:30), is also wildly funny and more relevant to the modern audience, while still retaining its all-important mystical otherworldliness. For side-splitting hilarity, nothing beats the silly plottiness and unexpected results offered by this type of theatre.
In a nutshell, Yvonne suspects her husband Victor of cheating on her, and gets her best friend, Lucienne, to write an anonymous note that may draw him to a local hostelry of ill-repute, intent on seeing if he'll grab the bait. In the periphery are Victor's best friend, Romain, who is unsuccessfully wooing Yvonne; Finache, his playboy doctor; Camille, his consonant-impaired secretary and cousin with a hidden life; Don Homenides de Histangua, Luciennes violently jealous Spanish husband who comes to misconstrue everything and pulls the inevitable pistol; and Porche, the porter of the above mentioned Inn who is the spitting image of Victor and leads everyone on a wild, wonderful goose chase. Believe me, this doesn't begin to describe the various, hilarious intrigues.
Theatre Works has done a wonderful job on a limited budget to put together this technically challenging and difficult-paced production. While it does have a few problems, considering what this play requires to be pulled off well, director Robyn Allen and this generally professional cast must be congratulated for their accomplishment.
Kudos go to the leads of this show. Travis Thurman in his dual roles of the posh Victor and the dim-witted Porche, manages to give a solid performance while dashing about the stage fleeing his pursuers and rushing about backstage performing his various quick changes to play both parts. Dina Kay is solid as the somewhat dim Yvonne, whose misplaced concerns cause the ensuing ruckus. Mary McGary as Lucienne sparkles as the less flighty best friend whose machinations unwittingly get her into trouble. Thom Morrison's doctor Finache is enjoyably haughty and hedonistic. Great comic relief comes from Greg Santos as the speech-impeded Camille and Beau Heckman's accented and jealous Spaniard. With just two minor exceptions, the rest of the supporting cast is at least solid and in some cases perform above and beyond the call of duty.
Farces are very intricate pieces, involving as much choreography and timing as acting. The cast accomplished this with panache, no small doubt to Robyn Allen's brisk pacing and blocking. It is very easy for one small error in movement or timing to cause a Farce to become a farce, but the show was handled professionally from the first moments onstage to the very end of the third act. Knowing that the cast had little time to work on the actual set makes their accomplishments even more impressive.
The script is consistently uproarious, and the cast is consummately professional. If there is anything that is a great letdown to the evening, it can only be the unimpressive but mostly functional set by Gregory Jaye, and the truly atrocious lighting by Paulla Lippert. The second act depends on an appearing and disappearing bed that barely worked, and the actors that stood near the front of the stage were bathed in a diffuse orange light that was beyond distracting. Margaret Emerson's costume design was wonderful to a point, and that point was the women's shoes, which were woefully out of place. The acting, directing and script, though, definitely overcome what technical problems were prevalent throughout the evening.
When most theatre companies have folded up shop and conceded the summer season as a general loss, Theatre Works has been bucking the trend. The other three plays in their so-called "Summer Stock Season" definitely have a commercial bent to them, depending on big-name plays like "Vanities" and "Damn Yankees" and big-name playwrights like Neil Simon. But this play, a genuine risk by a company twice their size and with twice their resources, gives Phoenix audiences a reason to crawl from their air-conditioned hideaways and brave their way to Peoria.
Production Details:
"A Flea in Her Ear" by George Feydeau (adapted by Barnett Shaw)
Theatre Works, Peoria
815-7930
June 28th-July 14th, 1996
Return to AARO
Return to AARO 95-96