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The English Channel at Suffolk University
This is probably one of the most intimidating reviews I've ever attempted to write. Robert Brustein is perhaps the most significant name in
American theater criticism in the past several decades. He is the person who, in many ways, codified and defined what a competent theater critic
should know and be, and what a competently-written theater review should include. Lis and I are trying to write things that fit in with some of
his ideas of criticism.
He is also the author of the new play The English Channel, which just had its world premiere at the newly-refurbished and gorgeous C.
Walsh theater at Suffolk University -- and therefore, there is a chance that he'll read this thing.
Um, Prof. Brustein, if you read this, please feel free to criticise our criticism -- we'd actually be very glad of your opinion of our opinions.
The English Channel is an example of the developing subgenre of "Will&Kit" fiction. There are enough examples out there of stories which imagine the relationships between Shakespeare and Marlowe, and their contemporaries, that one can start to notice themes and tropes among them. The stories range from the highfalutin' literary to porn, and even a few which are both.
Brustein's play isn't either extreme, but has elements that would appeal to fans of both types.
The content of the play doesn't break any new ground. The action is set in one room of the Mermaid Tavern outside London, where Shakespeare is living while the playhouses are closed, in April and May of 1593.
In terms of characterization and interpretation of events, Brustein generally chooses the interpretation most common among this subgenre. As various people and events were mentioned, I saw Lis marking off notes in her "Stories About Shakespeare and Marlowe Checklist": Robert Greene's Groatsworth of Wit, check; the Baines note, check; Dutch church libel as a frame-up, check. . . .
But, see -- all that is just the framework. Sure, Brustein stole the plot and outline of the play, from history and from other writers' interpretations of history, Of course he did: it's a play about freakin'Shakespeare. If you're writing a play about Shakespeare, and NOT stealing the plot, you're kind of missing the point. Shakespeare is about writing characters, and about language.
So, let's start with language. On that matter, let me give my highest commendation: Robert Brustein must be totally out of his frickin' mind. I know of no higher praise I can give an artist.
He wrote the entire play in iambic pentameter. If that was just a stunt, I'd have enjoyed it, just for the novelty and "goddamned cool" factor. But it wasn't a stunt. It worked. The story which the play tells, the characters on the stage -- they need to talk in blank verse. It just is who they are. Of course the historical people on whom these characters are based didn't do that -- but we're not watching the historical people. We are watching the characters which Brustein wrote -- and they are characters who think in poetry.
Okay, that's enough about the play as written, for now: what about the play as performed?
Set designer Richard Chambers gave us Shakespeare's small, cramped room above a tavern, with a mattress on the floor, a desk and a chair, an armoire, a bench, and all the props that the theater company owned that had to go SOMEWHERE when the theaters were closed. The effect is flashy, vibrant, and claustrophobic.
The play's four characters are Kit Marlowe (Sean Dugan), Emilia Lanier (Merritt Janson), Henry Wriothesley, the Earl of Southampton (Alex Pollock), and William Shakespeare (Gabriel Field).
The costuming of Southampton appears based on his portrait from 1600, but the portrayal is also influenced by the 1590s Cobbe portrait -- you know: this one -- also known as "That's No Lady; That's the Earl of Southampton" Portrait. Shakespeare's costuming is reminiscent of the Chandos portrait,and Marlowe's look is, thankfully, not based on the Corpus Christi portrait.
It's a small play -- one room, four characters, and the proscenium arch works perfectly for it. As Lis and I review mostly Shakespeare stuff, we're actually more used to non-proscenium stages (we generally feel that most of Shakespeare, with the possible exception of his later Romances such as Pericles, don't naturally fit with the proscenium), But you can feel when a play is written for the proscenium, and this one is. The claustrophobia of room, the energy of the four people, is contained in the stage-space, making something of a pressure cooker.
And there's plenty of pressure to cook. Political plots, sexual affairs, jealousy, treason, spying, and all the other things that you'd expect from any "Bill and Kit's Excellent Adventure". But what's actually happening is secondary to the characters.
Among four characters, there are six relationships, some sexual, some not. Will's schtupping Emilia, Emilia's schtupping Will and Southampton, Southampton's schtupping Emilia and Kit. Kit considers himself to be Will's friend and inspiration -- or, at least, Will steals all the best ideas from him, Southampton is Will's patron.
Southampton is a traitor, Kit is a spy for the Queen, Will is stuck between them.
, and
In the mix, I feel Emilia's character gets a bit lost. She feels somewhat one-note. Admittedly, it's a really interesting note: she's a firm believer in women's strength and dignity and inherent worthin a time where that's hardly the prevailing norm -- and it does put her in an interesting position, with interesting conflicts. But she still seems shallower than the other characters. After their first couple scenes together, which I enjoyed, it feels like every conversation between Emilia and Will devolves into carping and bickering -- which is okay -- about the same topics over and over again -- which is not okay. An argument that you've already had gets boring the second time around.
Southampton is a powerful and relatively simple character -- at least compaired to the rest of the cast. He is nineteen, passionate, driven, and impetious. He is driven by a lust for adventure, for conspiracy, for excitement, and for, well, lust. He is beautiful, and knows it. He shows up on stage like a meteor -- bright, hot, and heading to burn up. He is in the "live fast, die young, and leave a good-looking corpse" mode.
So is Marlowe. But Marlowe is a bit older: twenty-nine to Southampton's nineteen. He is perhaps equally as impetuous, lustful, and adventurous, but, if not more cautious, at least more skilled. . . which makes a bit of irony as to which of them is alive at the end of the play, but that's history, and historical fiction, for you.
I found Marlowe to be my favorite character, until one of his final scenes, when Dugan, unfortunately, hit one of my pet peeves: he Played Drunk Badly.
I don't know why so many stage actors can't act as if they are drunk. It's not like actors typically are unfamiliar with alcohol, and yet it is extremely common for them to stagger about the stage in an annoyingly unconvincing manner.
Nonetheless, I liked the rest of his performance, both as a living Marlowe, and in his role as a ghost, delivering the prologue of the play and helping bring about the resolution.
Shakeseare is the central character in the play -- there are very few moments in which he is not on stage. Brustein's conceit for Shakespeare is that he does not naturally have a strong personality of his own, but rather channels the personalities of others -- influenced both by the flesh-and-blood people around him, and by the characters he channels as he writes his plays. It's a difficult concept to play on the stage, and Field does it well. He does have his own passions and motivations, but he finds them shaped by the powerful personalities around him. When he butts heads with Emilia, it is as much because her ideas of what women are are in conflict with what Southampton and Marlowe think women are -- in effect, Emilia is in conflict with the other two men in the play, through the medium of Shakespeare, as much as she is in conflict wih Shakespeare himself.
The further conflict in Shakespeare's character is a between Brustien's conceit of "playwright" versus "poet". His idea is that poet creates a work which is an expression of his or her own personality, while a playwright is a channel for the personalities of the fictional personalities which inhabit his or her mind. And the play includes this conflict within Shakespeare -- when he is writing sonnets, he is expressing more of his own personality, but that personality is easily subsumed under the overwhelming personalities around him, and by their very language. Brustein has fun with a Shakespeare in Love-like conceit in which Shakespeare observes and absorbs the witty turns of phrase, and the motivations and actions, of the people around him in order to use them in his own writing, and Field appears to enjoy playing that aspect of the character.
In general, The English Channel has a decent but unoriginal plot, four fascinating characters, and amazing language. It very much works as a play, and deserves to be played regularly. And this is a worthy first production of a worthy play.
There are four more productions, next week:
Thursday, September 13: 7:30 pm
Friday, September 14: 7:30 pm
Saturday, September 15 3:00 pm & 7:30 pm
All seats are General Admission. Please note that the content of this play is not recommended for children.
Tickets for the general public are $30 and $15 for students with ID.
Box office: Theatre Mania, 866-811-4111
American theater criticism in the past several decades. He is the person who, in many ways, codified and defined what a competent theater critic
should know and be, and what a competently-written theater review should include. Lis and I are trying to write things that fit in with some of
his ideas of criticism.
He is also the author of the new play The English Channel, which just had its world premiere at the newly-refurbished and gorgeous C.
Walsh theater at Suffolk University -- and therefore, there is a chance that he'll read this thing.
Um, Prof. Brustein, if you read this, please feel free to criticise our criticism -- we'd actually be very glad of your opinion of our opinions.
The English Channel is an example of the developing subgenre of "Will&Kit" fiction. There are enough examples out there of stories which imagine the relationships between Shakespeare and Marlowe, and their contemporaries, that one can start to notice themes and tropes among them. The stories range from the highfalutin' literary to porn, and even a few which are both.
Brustein's play isn't either extreme, but has elements that would appeal to fans of both types.
The content of the play doesn't break any new ground. The action is set in one room of the Mermaid Tavern outside London, where Shakespeare is living while the playhouses are closed, in April and May of 1593.
In terms of characterization and interpretation of events, Brustein generally chooses the interpretation most common among this subgenre. As various people and events were mentioned, I saw Lis marking off notes in her "Stories About Shakespeare and Marlowe Checklist": Robert Greene's Groatsworth of Wit, check; the Baines note, check; Dutch church libel as a frame-up, check. . . .
But, see -- all that is just the framework. Sure, Brustein stole the plot and outline of the play, from history and from other writers' interpretations of history, Of course he did: it's a play about freakin'Shakespeare. If you're writing a play about Shakespeare, and NOT stealing the plot, you're kind of missing the point. Shakespeare is about writing characters, and about language.
So, let's start with language. On that matter, let me give my highest commendation: Robert Brustein must be totally out of his frickin' mind. I know of no higher praise I can give an artist.
He wrote the entire play in iambic pentameter. If that was just a stunt, I'd have enjoyed it, just for the novelty and "goddamned cool" factor. But it wasn't a stunt. It worked. The story which the play tells, the characters on the stage -- they need to talk in blank verse. It just is who they are. Of course the historical people on whom these characters are based didn't do that -- but we're not watching the historical people. We are watching the characters which Brustein wrote -- and they are characters who think in poetry.
Okay, that's enough about the play as written, for now: what about the play as performed?
Set designer Richard Chambers gave us Shakespeare's small, cramped room above a tavern, with a mattress on the floor, a desk and a chair, an armoire, a bench, and all the props that the theater company owned that had to go SOMEWHERE when the theaters were closed. The effect is flashy, vibrant, and claustrophobic.
The play's four characters are Kit Marlowe (Sean Dugan), Emilia Lanier (Merritt Janson), Henry Wriothesley, the Earl of Southampton (Alex Pollock), and William Shakespeare (Gabriel Field).
The costuming of Southampton appears based on his portrait from 1600, but the portrayal is also influenced by the 1590s Cobbe portrait -- you know: this one -- also known as "That's No Lady; That's the Earl of Southampton" Portrait. Shakespeare's costuming is reminiscent of the Chandos portrait,and Marlowe's look is, thankfully, not based on the Corpus Christi portrait.
It's a small play -- one room, four characters, and the proscenium arch works perfectly for it. As Lis and I review mostly Shakespeare stuff, we're actually more used to non-proscenium stages (we generally feel that most of Shakespeare, with the possible exception of his later Romances such as Pericles, don't naturally fit with the proscenium), But you can feel when a play is written for the proscenium, and this one is. The claustrophobia of room, the energy of the four people, is contained in the stage-space, making something of a pressure cooker.
And there's plenty of pressure to cook. Political plots, sexual affairs, jealousy, treason, spying, and all the other things that you'd expect from any "Bill and Kit's Excellent Adventure". But what's actually happening is secondary to the characters.
Among four characters, there are six relationships, some sexual, some not. Will's schtupping Emilia, Emilia's schtupping Will and Southampton, Southampton's schtupping Emilia and Kit. Kit considers himself to be Will's friend and inspiration -- or, at least, Will steals all the best ideas from him, Southampton is Will's patron.
Southampton is a traitor, Kit is a spy for the Queen, Will is stuck between them.
, and
In the mix, I feel Emilia's character gets a bit lost. She feels somewhat one-note. Admittedly, it's a really interesting note: she's a firm believer in women's strength and dignity and inherent worthin a time where that's hardly the prevailing norm -- and it does put her in an interesting position, with interesting conflicts. But she still seems shallower than the other characters. After their first couple scenes together, which I enjoyed, it feels like every conversation between Emilia and Will devolves into carping and bickering -- which is okay -- about the same topics over and over again -- which is not okay. An argument that you've already had gets boring the second time around.
Southampton is a powerful and relatively simple character -- at least compaired to the rest of the cast. He is nineteen, passionate, driven, and impetious. He is driven by a lust for adventure, for conspiracy, for excitement, and for, well, lust. He is beautiful, and knows it. He shows up on stage like a meteor -- bright, hot, and heading to burn up. He is in the "live fast, die young, and leave a good-looking corpse" mode.
So is Marlowe. But Marlowe is a bit older: twenty-nine to Southampton's nineteen. He is perhaps equally as impetuous, lustful, and adventurous, but, if not more cautious, at least more skilled. . . which makes a bit of irony as to which of them is alive at the end of the play, but that's history, and historical fiction, for you.
I found Marlowe to be my favorite character, until one of his final scenes, when Dugan, unfortunately, hit one of my pet peeves: he Played Drunk Badly.
I don't know why so many stage actors can't act as if they are drunk. It's not like actors typically are unfamiliar with alcohol, and yet it is extremely common for them to stagger about the stage in an annoyingly unconvincing manner.
Nonetheless, I liked the rest of his performance, both as a living Marlowe, and in his role as a ghost, delivering the prologue of the play and helping bring about the resolution.
Shakeseare is the central character in the play -- there are very few moments in which he is not on stage. Brustein's conceit for Shakespeare is that he does not naturally have a strong personality of his own, but rather channels the personalities of others -- influenced both by the flesh-and-blood people around him, and by the characters he channels as he writes his plays. It's a difficult concept to play on the stage, and Field does it well. He does have his own passions and motivations, but he finds them shaped by the powerful personalities around him. When he butts heads with Emilia, it is as much because her ideas of what women are are in conflict with what Southampton and Marlowe think women are -- in effect, Emilia is in conflict with the other two men in the play, through the medium of Shakespeare, as much as she is in conflict wih Shakespeare himself.
The further conflict in Shakespeare's character is a between Brustien's conceit of "playwright" versus "poet". His idea is that poet creates a work which is an expression of his or her own personality, while a playwright is a channel for the personalities of the fictional personalities which inhabit his or her mind. And the play includes this conflict within Shakespeare -- when he is writing sonnets, he is expressing more of his own personality, but that personality is easily subsumed under the overwhelming personalities around him, and by their very language. Brustein has fun with a Shakespeare in Love-like conceit in which Shakespeare observes and absorbs the witty turns of phrase, and the motivations and actions, of the people around him in order to use them in his own writing, and Field appears to enjoy playing that aspect of the character.
In general, The English Channel has a decent but unoriginal plot, four fascinating characters, and amazing language. It very much works as a play, and deserves to be played regularly. And this is a worthy first production of a worthy play.
There are four more productions, next week:
Thursday, September 13: 7:30 pm
Friday, September 14: 7:30 pm
Saturday, September 15 3:00 pm & 7:30 pm
All seats are General Admission. Please note that the content of this play is not recommended for children.
Tickets for the general public are $30 and $15 for students with ID.
Box office: Theatre Mania, 866-811-4111