Review: ‘Doubt’ is a dynamite drama at N.C. Stage
Jim Cavener • TAKE 5 CORRESPONDENT • published October 24, 2008 12:15 am
As N.C. Stage Company has established a six-year record of producing high quality theater in a variety of genres, director Hans Meyer has a track record of locating intellectually stimulating and morally challenging scripts. Now he’s come up with John Patrick Shanley’s script of “Doubt — A Parable.”
Meyer has brought in four actors virtually unknown to Asheville audiences, though two of them have appeared at nearby Flat Rock Playhouse. That relatively unknown quality will not be for long. These are splendid talents and we’ll see more of them, we hope.
The setting of “Doubt” is a Roman Catholic parish in The Bronx, New York. The year is 1964, when many Roman parishes still had their own parochial schools. The small cast is make up of the parish priest, the nun who is principal of the school, another nun who teaches in the school and the mother of one of the students — who we never see, but nevertheless figures mightily in the story line.
Father Flynn is played by Brian Robinson, a Charlotte actor who gives us intensity and credibility, just as the script calls for. Charlotte actress Rebecca Koon gives us Sister Aloysius, the school principal. She is a cold and calculating number, one stern nun in the tradition of the wrist- slapping Mother Superiors of legend. Julia VanderVeen is Sister James, the younger and more flexible nun, in a touching performance. Mrs. Muller, mother of the controversial student, is portrayed by Brandie Moore. This is a masterpiece of interpretation.
The dramatic vehicle is the conflict between doubt and certainty. Not just in the spiritual realm, but in the nitty-gritty of daily life and struggles. There are sexual issues, alcohol issues, racial issues and spiritual issues, for starters. One line helps us focus on the drama: “Doubt can be a bond as powerful as certainty.”
And a drama it is. There are no simple solutions and we leave the theater asking many questions.
The dual set: the principal’s office and a parish courtyard, is richly textured as designed by Andrew Mannion. Director Meyer is credited with sound design, which probably covers the appropriately somber and ominous music used in transitions between scenes. There is no intermission, and the show runs barely 90 minutes. But, there is enough drama in that 90 minutes to register the evening as a memorable one.
“Doubt” is surely a philosophical exercise, as well as a psychological excursion into the mental bowels of highly-charged individuals. Listen for the parable in one of Father Flynn’s homilies. It’s a zinger and a clue to the meat of the story. Clear your mind before the curtain-speech. It’s gonna be a rocky ride across the NCSC stage.
24 October 2008
Doubt
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This is from the Charlotte Observer, about the same production
BG--
Superb script, skilled actors showcase complex ‘Doubt'
By Julie Reed
“Doubt can be a bond as powerful as certainty,” says the charismatic Father Flynn.
This line, in the opening monologue of “Doubt, a Parable,” resonates through the riveting N.C. Stage Company production at Duke Energy Theatre at Spirit Square.
The play by John Patrick Shanley won the 2005 Tony Award for best play and the Pulitzer Prize for drama. It's a tightly written, thought-provoking work, and the four actors create nuanced portraits of the characters.
Set in a Bronx parochial school in 1964, “Doubt” is more complex than surface descriptions might suggest. It is structured as a clash of wills and generations between the hard-nosed principal Sister Aloysius (played by Rebecca Koon) and the more easygoing Father Flynn (played by Brian Robinson), the young priest who may be having an inappropriate relationship with one of the schoolboys, Donald Muller.
This dark suspicion is the intuition of Sister Aloysius, and she badgers the naïve Sister James (Julia VanderVeen) into helping her force a confrontation with the priest.
VanderVeen is all wide-eyed innocence at the start of the play. She is afraid of Sister Aloysius, as is everyone at the school, while she practically idolizes Father Flynn. Her character's descent into doubt is pointedly affecting as we see the light in her eyes gradually fade away.
“Innocence is only wisdom in a world without evil,” says Sister Aloysius. While this may be true, it's a painful lesson to learn.
Koon brings a steely resolve to the part of Sister Aloysius; she is small and birdlike physically, but there is no mistaking her steadfast moral convictions.
While “Doubt” is an engrossing drama, it has comedy as well, especially evident in the distaste of Sister Aloysius for modern conveniences, such as ballpoint pens.
Koon makes an ideal foil for the handsome and charming Robinson; their scenes together illustrate the transfer of power from one to the other and back again. As portrayed by Robinson, Father Flynn is an infinitely likeable and sympathetic character – making it all the harder to believe he could be capable of such horrible behavior.
Sister Aloysius calls in the boy's mother to her office for a chat. This is the only scene for Brandie Moore, as Mrs. Muller, and it is a shocking one. Moore gives an arresting performance as a woman who sees the bigger picture for her son, the only African American boy at the school.
“Doubt” is 90 minutes, without intermission, and is fluidly directed by Hans Meyer. The set by Andrew Mannion connects the principal's office, with its dingy tile floors, to the worn paving stones of the church courtyard. Arched stained-glass windows give way to outside archways. Sound design, also by Meyer, is effective, especially the incidental music.
“Doubt” does not provide easy answers, but its excellent production values, nuanced acting and absorbing script make for a compelling experience.
And another perspective, this from Charlotte's "Creative Loafing." (Doubt transferred to Charlotte for a two-week run after closing in Asheville.)
BG--
By Perry Tannenbaum
Note to North Carolina Stage Company: there is definite overlap between your audience here in Charlotte and ticket-buyers who pick up on the serious dramas at Belk Theater in the Broadway Lights Series. There's no other reason why the Asheville-based company, after building up massive goodwill with Moonlight and Magnolias and It's a Wonderful Life in previous stints at Spirit Square, should be unable to fill the front row at Duke Energy for their superb realization of Doubt.
Apparently patrons who saw those productions must have snapped up tickets when Tony Award winner Cherry Jones headlined the national touring edition of John Patrick Shanley's Pulitzer-Prize parable on the pitfalls of rectitude, righteousness, and certainty. To them, I repeat my accusation: too much Shakespeare! You've been Bardwashed if you think only Shakespearean classics are worthy of multiple viewings.
Shanley's script isn't only an exploration of what consequences a charismatic priest, Father Flynn, should suffer when he's suspected of molesting Donald Muller, the first black student at St. Nicholas Catholic School in the Bronx -- some 40 years before the Boston pedophile priest scandals. The clash between Flynn and school principal Sister Aloysius, stubbornly convinced of his guilt and implacably determined to force his removal, is still riveting. Provocatively, Doubt also explores questions of how to teach, how to parent and how to be Christian. With a side order of gender issues.
If Rebecca Koon and Brian Robinson, both two-time CL Actors of the Year, aren't quite as towering as Jones and Brian O'Byrne were in the original Manhattan Theatre Club production, it's partly because neither Koon nor Robinson have any Tony Award auras for director Hans Meyer to defer to. All the better for letting the spotlight fall a little more tellingly on the supporting characters -- young Sister James, caught in the Flynn-Aloysius crossfire and experiencing a gut-wrenching crisis as a teacher, and Mrs. Muller, facing a sensational crisis in parenting.
Let me be blunt. Robinson and Koon are as good as ever, placing their own unique stamps on Flynn and his nemesis, while Julia VanderVeen as Sister James and Brandie Moore as Donald's mom are better than the actresses I've seen before in those roles -- at the PAC or in New York.
So avoid the flames of hell and get your butt over to Spirit Square this week, OK?
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