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PAOLA NOGUERAS
Starring in "The Illusion," written by Pierre Corneille and adapted by Tony Kushner, (from the left) Carl C. Granieri as Clindor, Luke Moyer as Matamore, and Rachel Anne Stephan as Isabelle.
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This 'tragicomedy' tends toward fun
In Villanova Theatre's production of The Illusion, things are not always as they seem. This 17th-century "tragicomedy" by Pierre Corneille was "freely adapted" in the 1980s by Tony Kushner, with the result being a self-conscious (in the best possible way) examination of truth and the illusory nature of love.
With elements of As You Like It, Don Quixote and Dr. Faustus - all works by Corneille contemporaries - Kushner's adaptation takes the melange a step further when one character declares the proceedings "classic and tragic, as if penned by Racine," the joke being that Corneille and Racine were literary rivals.
So that's about enough high-minded discussion on this piece, because more than anything else, The Illusion is fun, charming and not the least bit afraid of Mel Brooks-style shtick.
When anguished father Pridamant (James F. Schlatter) approaches magician Alcandre (Paul Guerin) to see if the wizard can offer a vision of his estranged son, Pridamant gives this angst-inducing reason: "I want to make him sick with guilt; I want to make him the heir to my fortune."
The son, Clindor (Carl C. Granieri), is shown as servant to a lunatic, Matamore (Luke Moyer), who explains to Isabelle (Rachel Anne Stephan), the object of both men's affections, "I'm collecting my pithiest sayings in a book." Notes Clindor, deadpan, "This one is full of pith."
Director Harriet Power strikes the right balance between the play's grave and comic elements - after all, woven in with the fun, in typical Kushner style, are themes of love, betrayal and death. Powers' inclusion of winking audience asides never overwhelms moments of eye-locked smolder between lovers. Granieri does his best to sizzle as the social-climbing playboy with a heart of gold, and Stephan is an earnest ingenue, if a bit too breathy in her romantic distress.
However, Moyer and Kristen O'Rourke, as Isabelle's maid, are the standouts here in supporting roles that bring context and weight to the lovers' affair.
In the production's other supporting roles, Charlotte Cloe Fox Wind's costumes add brocaded, gleaming texture, color and shine to balance Frank McCullough's bleak subterranean set, a pairing that echoes Powers' thematic balance.
As Alcandre's final monologue observes, "A simple gray rock is a thousand times more tangible than love," but as The Illusion demonstrates, given the choice, there are very few who chase after or dream about the tangible.
