FANTASTIC FOUR

Musketeers ride again in SSC's rousing 'Man In the Iron Mask'

It's a rare treat to get to review a brand new play at Shakespeare Santa Cruz. It's even more fun when the play is as rollicking a success as Scott Wentworth's delicious The Man in the Iron Mask. The second offering in SSC's 2012 season, it's a sequel to last season's popular production of The Three Musketeers. Using material from two later Alexandre Dumas novels, Wentworth and director John Sipes collaborate to give the audience piling into the Sinsheimer-Stanley Festival Glen everything they've come to see—action, humor, love, honor, and plenty of roistering camaraderie.

20 years after events in the last play, the original three Musketeers have retired. Their former comrade-in-arms, D'Artagnan (Kit Wilder) has become Captain of the King's Musketeers, although now he serves a new king, son of his last employer—pleasure-seeking, war-mongering young Louis XIV (Charles Pasternak). The dying Queen Mother, Anne of Austria (an elegant, heartfelt Marion Adler), sets the plot in motion with a secret visit to ex-Musketeer, Aramis (V Craig Heidenreich), now a priest, with a terrible confession: her part in the unjust imprisonment of a young boy in the Bastille years earlier.

Meanwhile, Porthos (Ted Barton), now a wealthy baron hosting the king's upcoming birthday fete, is fretting about the state of his wardrobe. Athos (the formidable Dierk Torsek), now a count, has retired to a contemplative, teetotaler's life on his country estate—until King Louis sends Athos' only son, the dashing guardsman, Raoul (Armando McLain) off to a volatile war zone so the king can bring Raoul's betrothed, Louise (Lisa Kitchens), to court, and seduce her.

Aramis discovers the masked prisoner is Philippe (also Pasternak, wonderful in both dual roles), compassionate twin brother to Louis with just as legitimate a claim to the throne. Intrigues abound, loyalties are tested, friendships renewed, honor upheld, and, of course, swords are crossed as the plot gallops along. The play is both stirring and funny, especially when the old comrades are onstage together. ("Age before Beauty." "Pearls before swine," Athos and Porthos spar, each attempting to politely usher the other through a doorway.) And the cast is terrific. (Read more)

(Above: Kit Wilder as D'Artagnan (left) with Gabriel Lawrence as conniving Royal Guardsman De Wardes. Photo by rr jones.)

SWASHBUCKLER ALERT

Say you've got a budding young swashbuckler in your life. Maybe she or he has seen too many Pirates of the Caribbean sequels, but when other kids are off at the beach or the skatepark, yours is in the back yard with an old broom handle, shouting, "En garde!" and practicing to thrust, parry and riposte.

Well, here's your chance to earn major brownie points by treating your young pirate-in-training to a live performance of Shakespeare Santa Cruz's rip-snorting new production of The Man in the Iron Mask—for free!

A brand new play penned by SSC stalwart Scott Wentworth, Iron Mask is a sequel to last season's hugely popular production of The Three Musketeers. It's based on a later novel by Alexandre Dumas in which the older Musketeers come out of retirement to join D'Artagnan for one last escapade, replacing the corrupt and heartless King Louis XIV with his compassionate twin brother, who has been imprisoned all his life.

If last season's twin productions of Musketeers and King Henry IV Part 1 are any indication, Iron Mask is sure to kick up some dust in the Festival Glen with plenty of action, clashing swords, and derring-do. And you can and your little swashbuckler can be a part of it when SSC presents Atlantis Fantasyworld Day on Saturday, August 4.

In partnership with the beloved local comic shop, SSC is offering one free child's ticket with the purchase of a full-priced adult ticket for the 2 pm performance of The Man in the Iron Mask on Saturday, August 4, only. Purchase tickets by phone (831 459-2159) or in person at the UCSC Ticket Office. Mention the code word "Atlantis" to get your free child's ticket for this performance; but the offer is only good for tickets purchased in advance before July 29. That's this coming Sunday, so act fast!

But wait, there's more: kids are invited to come in costume as their favorite Musketeer to participate in a pre-show costume contest at 12:30 pm on the 4th. Winner of the costume contest will receive a hardcover graphic novel of The Man in the Iron Mask from Atlantis.

Meanwhile, get in the mood for the new play (it opens this Saturday night), by revisiting my highly subjective history of Three Musketeers adaptations, Dueling Musketeers, which I posted last year at just about this time. En garde!

ALL FOR NOTHING

Almost everything that could possibly go wrong, did, in Paul W. S. Anderson's misbegotten attempt to turn Alexandre Dumas' elegant classic, The Three Musketeers, into a cheesy, CGI-laden superhero franchise. If you love Dumas' rousing tale as much as I do (as you might remember from my previous blog), you'll cringe at the concept of Athos as an underwater ninja, Aramis wrapped in a cape swooping off tall buildings like Batman, Porthos as a Hulk-like strongman pulling his chains out of stone walls to attack his prison guards. These guys are assassins, committing mayhem with soulless efficiency; it's half an hour into the movie before anybody even draws a sword.

Anderson makes an oily bouillabaisse out of Dumas's sprightly storyline. In this version, childish King Louis XIII (Freddie Fox) and his poised young Queen Anne (Juno Temple) are in love with each other, but too shy to speak of it. Gone is the neglected queen's dangerous liasion with the Duke of Buckingham, played by Orlando Bloom as a fop in an Elvis pompadour, now temporarily in league with the villainous Milady de Winter (Milla Jovovich). (There's a dreary Pirates of the Caribbean-like sameness to the way all the villains keep double-crossing each other.)

Most egregious is the notion that Milady was once a veritable Fourth Musketeer, and Athos' true love. Anyone who actually understands what the story is about will recoil at the idea of Athos, the noblest, most honorable and ruthless of all the Musketeers, ever allying himself with the faithless, opportunistic Milady—especially as she's portrayed by Jovovich as a pouty little tart. (This movie is so amped up, Milady can't simply enter a room by stealth; she has to bungee-jump off the top of a stone angel on the roof—in a corset, yet—in broad daylight, to a balcony below.)

Another pointless addition to the plot is a set of plans stolen out of a secret "Da Vinci Vault," for a flying warship, a ferociously armed wooden sailing ship under an enormous balloon. This could be a very cool thing if handled with any kind of panache, but let's face it, the movies haven't gotten steampunk right since 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea. (Remember The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen? Or, worse, Van Helsing?) When this warship lumbers into view and starts raining down random destruction from an arsenal of cannon that blast away like machine guns, it's just ugly. And when two of them go into battle against each other, it's ridiculous how much time is wasted in the ships strafing each other's decks before someone finally gets the bright idea to blow a hole in the other's balloon.

Equally full of hot air is the jokey, creaky dialogue, stuffed with lugubrious, faux-arch witticisms. (Although I did smile when Constance (Gabrielle Wilde) tells Logan Lerman's gauche young puppy of a D'Artagnan, "In the battle of wits, you, sir, are unarmed.")

What else did I like in this movie? Matthew Macfadyen, Ray Stevenson and Luke Evans are terrific as Athos, Porthos, and Aramis—in the fleeting moments they get to play the characters Dumas wrote. And there are some evocatively imagined CGI vistas of 17th Century Paris.

The great Danish actor Mads Mikkelsen plays antagonist Count de Rochefort exactly as the material demands—as a cartoon—fortunately disguised in a plumed hat and eyepatch most of the time. Less fortunate in Christoph Waltz as evil Cardinal Richelieu, who seems more peevish than dangerous, and about as sinister as Snidely Whiplash. Any director who can't get purring menace out of Christoph Waltz, of all people, playing Cardinal flipping Richelieu, obviously doesn't know what he's doing.

There's nothing here to challenge Richard Lester's classic 1973 film adaptation. And it certainly won't make anyone forget the dash and brio of last summer's live SSC production.

COMING SOON...

When sharks, apes, Barbarians, and (yawn) teens in peril dominate local screens, we know we're stuck in the post-Labor Day movie doldrums. But fear not: the fresh breezes of fall are on the way, bringing with them a batch of eclectic and interesting new films. Here are a select few of the most promising (we hope):

DRIVE Onetime Oscar nominee Ryan Gosling steps out of his perceived comfort zone with a vengeance in this majorly buzzed action thriller, based on the James Sallis novel.

THE THREE MUSKETEERS It would be tough to top Richard Lester's fresh, rollicking two-part production of the early '70s, so why am I so intrigued by this new film version? The cast, for one thing, starting with Christoph Walz as the scheming Cardinal Richelieu.

ANONYMOUS Okay, I get a little peeved at these conspiracy theories that anyone other than the artist historically known as William Shakespeare wrote the canon of plays attributed to him. This film purports to argue in favor of Edward De Vere, Earl of Oxford. But the movie stills look lush and expensive, and with Vanessa Redgrave and real-life daughter Joely Richardson on board as Good Queen Bess (in youth and age), I'm there.

THE RUM DIARY Johnny Depp returns to Fear-and-Loathing mode in this adaptation of the Hunter S. Thompson novel (begun in 1959, but not published until the late '90s), a lightly fictionalized account of the author's early stint as a reporter for a run-down newspaper in San Juan, Puerto Rico.

MY WEEK WITH MARILYN Worlds collided in 1957 when glamorous Hollywood movie star Marilyn Monroe, and acclaimed British thespian Laurence Olivier made a movie together. A memoir about that film shoot inspires this film, starring the ever-gutsy Michelle Williams. (Read complete article)

(Above: Joely Richardson and Jamie Campbell Bower dance around the question of who wrote Shakespeare's plays in Anonymous.)

LIVE THEATER: AND HOW!

You say there's an unseasonable chill in the air? My suggestion is to grab a loved one and a bottle of something fortifying and hie thee off to Shakespeare Santa Cruz for a bracing late-summer evening (or matinee) of live theater. SSC's 30th Anniversary season continues for one more week, with all three of its excellent productions playing in repertory from tonight through this Sunday (August 28).

I highly recommend Danny Scheie's hilarious reboot of The Comedy of Errors for the indoor Mainstage—8 intrepid performers, 20 speaking parts, and a gazillion laughs. I also had a blast at Art Manke's dynamic production of The Three Musketeers outside in the Festival Glen, impressive in its fidelity to the breadth of the original Dumas novel, and rousing good fun.

Meanwhile, I finally caught up with the third SSC production, Henry IV: Part 1. Like all Shakespeare's history plays, this one is a bit troublesome to modern audiences who may not be well-versed in the arcanae of 15th Century English politics. But Scott Wentworth's smart and often innovative production keeps viewers informed and entertained.

Wentworth has the bright idea to start with a little backstory in a montage of key scenes from Richard II (the previous play in Shakespeare's history cycle, about the previous monarch), which is slyly introduced, TV series-style, as "Previously, in Richard II..." It doesn't really sort out the plot all that effectively, but at least we get a visual program to help identify the players in the drama to come.

And the players are the thing in this drama. While the usual suspects (here, principally the rebellious Welsh) jockey for power around old King Henry IV, the king's wastrel son, Prince Hal (Erik Heger) is haunting the brothels and taverns of Cheapside with the rascally old reprobate, Sir John Falstaff (Richard Ziman), his mentor in sin. This is the first appearance of Falstaff in Shakespeare's ouvre, and Ziman (above) plays him with plenty of swaggering bonhomie, crisp diction, and an acute sense of how to make every laugh count. And while unafraid to show "Plump Jack" in all his cowardice and greed, Ziman's delivery of the speech on "honor" is as persuasive as it is drily comic.

Heger plays Prince Hal like a charismatic rock star on holiday. He's wise to the way Falstaff is playing him (in hopes of currying favors from the future king), and lets us know right up front it's all part of his plan to spring back into his father's good graces when the old king, and their enemies, least expect it. But in the meantime, he's enjoying himself hugely, among the fawning tarts and whoremongers of Cheapside, particularly in a very funny scene when Hal and Falstaff take turns enacting the part of Hal's disapproving father. (In his spare time, Heger even plays the harp in one of the lovely musical interludes Wentworth weaves into the drama.)

But best of all is J. Todd Adams as Hal's cousin, Harry Percy, or "Hotspur," who gets so ticked off at the old king's abuses that he joins the Welsh rebels. Adams is such a one-man dynamo, he commands attention every time he's onstage —even if he's only lurking in the shadows, looking on (although this live wire is not content to be an observer for long). Not only does Adams manage a lubricious North Country accent throughout, his aggressive, and yet wryly witty Hotspur is the spark that make the whole production go. He's a warrior on a mission; even his relationship with his wife (a feisty Katie MacNichol) is a lusty battlefield campaign between evenly-matched competitors.

Adams has been a Festival favorite since 2009, when he played a splendidly acrobatic Puck in Richard E. T. White's vivacious production of A Midsummer Night's Dream. (He had me at Puck's first careless backflip off the stage.) This season, he's also playing the romantic Aramis in Three Musketeers (which shares the same cast and the same outdoor set in the Glen with Henry IV), and it's enormous fun to see him playing two such opposite roles.

In fact, that's always been one of the great treats of SSC; watching company members double up to play diverse parts in two productions each season. Ziman juggles both Falstaff and the scheming, formidable Cardinal Richelieu in Musketeers. Allen Gilmore, Musketeers' noble Athos, rocks out as a pimp-like cutpurse, Poins, and the raging rebel Scot, Douglas, in Henry IV; MacNichol also plays the crafty villainess, Milady de Winter, in Musketeers. As the titular king Henry IV, V Craig Heidenreich is a bit more dyspeptic than kingly, but he plays villain Rochefort with silky, purring menace in Musketeers.

(And once again, B. Modern's costumes are a delight, from the faux-medieval black leather tunics and discreet chain mail accessories of the warrior men, to the tavern tarts' time-traveling dishabille. (Modern says she conjured "five centuries' worth of underwear" for her tarts.) To go backstage with Modern and Comedy designer Brandin Barón for a behind-the-scenes look at this year's SSC costume challenges, click here.)

Wentworth himself is best known to SSC audiences as an actor; he played Bottom in Dream and Brutus in Julius Caesar in the 2009 season. A s a director, he makes some intriguing choices in Henry IV: Part 1. Music is paramount, particularly some gorgeous vocal solos by Sepideh Moafi as both the wife of a Welsh rebel, and leader of a chorus of robed women whose rich, soulful chanting is offered up in counterpoint to the martial male action of the play. Owen Glendower, leader of the Welsh rebels, is played by Phil Hubbard as a robed mage and mystic, his court a half-fey, otherworldly stronghold full of eerie music and lilting Welsh dialogue. And when the climactic battle comes, Wentworth borrows a trick from the movies and stages it in slo-mo; it pays off—the effect is far more elegiac than the expected sword-clanking melee.

So forget about the confusing politics and soak up Henry IV: Part 1 for its entertaining performances and vivid stagecraft. (Tickets available here.) Remember, this is the last week!

SWORD PLAY

En garde! Prepare for serious roistering in The Three Musketeers, the second production of Shakespeare Santa Cruz's 30th Anniversary season. Adapted from Alexandre Dumas' evergreen swashbuckling classic, it's beautifully staged by director Art Manke outdoors in the Sinsheimer-Stanley Festival Glen. In this dynamic production, plots are hatched, troths are plighted, honor is impugned and defended, wars are fought, and swords are crossed at every opportunity. If it all feels a bit breathless, it's still rousing good fun.

Dumas' picaresque novel was first published in serial format in 1844. This new adaptation by playwrights Linda Alper, Douglas Langworthy, and Penny Metropulos (commissioned for the Oregon Shakespeare Festival in 1999) is impressive in its fidelity to the breadth of Dumas' novel. Plot-furthering climaxes chase each other across the stage at breakneck speed. Manke keeps the action fleet and fluid, in and out of the many compartments, balconies, terraces, draperies, and stairwells of Michael Ganio's formidable set. Some incidents feel rushed, but it's worth noting that director Richard Lester needed two feature-length films to tell the same story this adaptation covers in a fast couple of hours.

The story is set in 1620s France. D'Artagnan (Leigh Nichols Miller), a gauche and earnest youth from provincial Gascony, arrives in Paris hoping to join the king's elite guard of Musketeers. On the way, in a single morning, he manages to insult three of the most famed Musketeers, each of whom calls him out for a duel: vain popinjay Porthos (Kit Wilder), noble, philosophical Athos (Allen Gilmore), and chivalrous romantic Aramis (J. Todd Adams). (Read more)

DUELING MUSKETEERS

Next to pirates and Robin Hood, one of my absolute favorite swashbuckling properties is The Three Musketeers. I just about went nuts when I heard that Shakespeare Santa Cruz will be mounting a live-acton production of the Akexandre Dumas classic this summer—outdoors in the Redwood Glen, yet! Consider the possibilities for dueling, romance, and general rollicking. I can't wait!

The show opens this Saturday, but in the meantime, let's get in the mood by revisiting some previous incarnations of this durable tale. First and best, of course, is the book, which I devoured in college about the time the Richard Lester movie came out (see below). Written in 1844 and originally published as a magazine serial, the novel is set in the court of Louis XIII. The exploits of the upstart young Gascon, D'Artagnan, and his initiation into the ranks of the King's Musketeers explode across the page with swordplay, wit, honor, pathos, hairsbreadth escapes, illicit trysts, and excellent food and wine (as only a Frenchman could describe them). For all its dramatic and tragic plotlines, it's also a very funny book, highly recommended.

For my money, the adaptation that most closely captures the joie de vivre of the original is Richard Lester's 1974 film, The Three Musketeers. It's a delirious take on Dumas, bursting with fabulous costumes, excellent swordfighting, kinetic slapstick comedy (don't forget, Lester directed the first two Beatles movies), and buoyant camaraderie. Michael York makes a stalwart D'Artagnan, and the great Oliver Reed is a brooding Athos; Richard Chamberlain, at his prettiest, is the romantic Aramis, and Frank Finlay provides comic relief as fussy epicure Porthos. Raquel Welch proves herself an adept comedienne as Constance, the queen's lady-in-waiting (and D'Artagnan's beloved), who involves the swordsmen in palace intrigue. Charlton Heston and Faye Dunaway are terrific villains as scheming Cardinal Richelieu and his accomplice, Milady De Winter.

(A so-called sequel, The Four Musketeers, came out in 1975, but both were shot together, intended to be a single film. When the running time soared to three hours, the footage was chopped into two films, but watch both films together to get Dumas' whole story.)

It's not a singing-dancing role, but Gene Kelly in his prime makes an impossibly athletic, charmingly naive, and thoroughly stout-hearted D'Artagnan in the lavish, 1948 MGM version of The Three Musketeers. All-American June Allyson, however, is severely miscast as Constance (just look at her '40s page-boy hair-do!), and Ven Heflin, Robert Coote and an embryonic Gig Young play the Musketeers with varying degrees of success.

But Lana Turner is an interesting femme fatale as Milady DeWinter, and Vincent Price makes a fine and ruthless Cardinal Richelieu. Well worth seeing for its rich Technicolor cinematography and Kelly's outrageous acrobatics.

In The Man In the Iron Mask (1998), it's a great treat to see savvy screen veterans Jeremy Irons, John Malkovich, Gerard Depardieu, and Gabriel Byrne as Aramis, Athos, Porthos and D'Artagnan in the autumn of their lives. Leonardo DiCaprio is fun too, in the dual role of bratty young King Louis XIV and his mysterious, noble-hearted double, the masked prisoner who becomes the catalyst for the aging Musketeers' last adventure together. Writer-director Randall Wallace (Braveheart) overdoes the comic buffoonery a bit, but he constructs his story with economy and care, and the finale packs an emotional touché. Byrne is wonderful as a haunted and poignant D'Artagnan, but the entire terrific ensemble brings these familiar characters exuberantly to life in this rich adaptation of the last of Dumas' three Musketeer novels.

I'm also looking forward to a new version of The Three Musketeers due onscreen this coming October. Logan Lerman seems a bit young, even for D'Artagnan, but I love the idea of Matthew Macfadyen (Darcy in the most recent Pride and Prejudice) as Athos, and Luke Evans (the sexy handyman in Tamara Drewe) as Aramis. Not to mention the deliciously sinister Christoph Waltz as Richelieu.

This is not a comprehensive list, by any means. The less said about Peter Hyams' 2001 The Musketeer, the better, with its unfortunate attempt to graft trendy Hong Kong action-style stunts onto a western swashbuckler, and its ineffectual puppy of a DArtagnan (Justin Chambers). I opted out of ever watching the 1939 Three Musketeers starring (shudder) Don Ameche and the Ritz Brothers. Ditto the 1993 update with Chris O'Donnell, Charlie Sheen, Kiefer Sutherland, and Oliver Platt. (Young Swords, anyone?) (Although I have heard good report of Tim Curry as Cardinal Richelieu.) Barbie and the Three Musketeers? Oh, please.

But I must admit, I'm curious about the 1939 version of The Man in the Iron Mask directed by that great moody stylist, James Whale (Frankenstein). I'll try to catch up with it one of these days, and let you know.

Meanwhile, sharpen your blades and cock your hats, and I'll see you in the Glen!