Claudia La Rocco, February 22, 2008

February 15, 2008

David Cote, February 20, 2008

Moliere just can't win in this town. In October, the 17th-century master farceur was violently deconstructed at New York Theatre Workshop in Ivo van Hove's The Misanthrope (complete with cell phones and video screens). Now comes the other extreme: the mock-obsequious period fidelity displayed by the National Theater of the United States of America. In a brief prologue to NTUSA's silly, seductive Don Juan, actor James Stanley addresses the audience (which is seated on cheap folding stools and sipping free wine). He assures us that every detail of the shoestring production is imbued with a keen sense of historicity. In a weird way, he's telling the truth.

NTUSA creates low-budget jewel-box sets that are half ironic, half expressions of a nostalgic longing for theatrical magic. For Moliere's 1665 tragicomedy about the legendary lothario (Yehuda Duenyas, working the Vincent Gallo crazy-sexy vibe) and his puritanical servant Sganarelle (Jesse Hawley, pinched and distant), the company has crafted an in-the-round venue of painted backdrops and baroque tableaux. There are two impressive reveals at either end of the playing space: Don Juan's red-lit, pillow-strewn boudoir, and the stark, marbled mausoleum where the Statue of the Commander drags Don Juan to Hell. Plenty of slapstick, camp hysterics and silly sound effects add laughs.

This tongue-in-cheek condensed version, arranged by Stanley and Normandy Sherwood (who also acts), was cobbled together from every translation available. The spirit of textual mongrelism extends to the catch-as-catch-can performances, which are daffy, eclectic, overwrought and tossed-off. While literally�and intentionally-not on the same page, the actors somehow turn the lack of unifying style into an affectionate homage to an enduring classic.

Claudia La Rocco, February 15, 2008

Yehuda Duenyas plays the great seducer in this latest iteration of the 17th-century Moliere play, as envisioned by the Obie Award-winning National Theater of the United States of America. It may be the way Mr. Duenyas, above, hops about and gurgles with glee after a conquest. Or maybe it's his mildly crazed eyes, or the pale, flat expanse of his stomach, which seems to be entirely muscle free. Whatever the reason, he's irresistible, as is the play.

It is possible that you, an ardent New York theatergoer, are not aware that this great country possesses a national theater company, just as it is within the realm of possibility that you have yet to visit the Chocolate Factory, in Long Island City, Queens, where Don Juan is running. You might be forgiven for such oversights, as both the troupe and the theater are only a few years old. No matter. Now is your chance to make amends.

Don Juan is the National Theater's first crack at a classical text; this show even boasts costumes "authentically made out of real materials," according to the endearingly absurd promotional materials. The set is laid out around the theater's perimeter, so that the action shifts from scene to scene in time with the Don's manic sexual overdrive. Doing his best to keep up is the poor servant, Sganarelle (the wonderful Jesse Hawley), who navigates his master through the wreckage of love affairs in various stages of implosion. Eventually, of course, the flames catch up to Don Juan, who exits with a whimper, not a bang.

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THROW

Tuesday 9/16 at 7PM

1965UU

September 11 - October 4, 2008