Players' "Lettice" earns some "lovage"

Author: Alyssa O'Gallagher

If the name Peter Shaffer sounds at all familiar to you, you are probably one of three distinct types of people: an English major, a theater major or a rabid Harry Potter fan. Unfortunately for all of you Harry Potheads out there, a scantily-clad equiphilian Daniel Radcliffe did not grace the Town Hall Theater with his presence this weekend. While perhaps Shaffer is best known, of late, for casting everyone's favorite wizard in the most recent run of "Equus", the Middlebury Community Players (MCP) chose this past weekend to perform one of Shaffer's more comedic plays, "Lettice and Lovage," originally written for another Potter alum, Dame Maggie Smith.

If you've never heard of this thoroughly British comedy, you may be wondering, as I was, how such a blatant typo made its way into the title. It turns out that Lettice does not refer at all to the vegetable, but to the title character, Lettice Douffet (played by the College's own Director of Health and Wellness Education Jyoti Daniere). While Daniere is probably best known around campus for organizing various health workshops, including everyone's favorite "Let's Talk About Sex Week," she also has some thespian blood running in her veins.

Her character, Lettice, is a tour guide in the Fustian House, an old English hall which, while boring, apparently has historic significance. She begins regaling visitors with her own "improved" version of history and gets away with it for quite some time, as apparently many college tour guides do. Did you know that McCardell Bicentennial Hall actually is not the biggest building in Vermont? That is until Lotte Schoen, a Fustian house employee (played by a very convincingly British Elizabeth Christensen), apprehends and promptly fires her.

A strange turn of events finds the women reunited 10 weeks later in Lettice's apartment, bonding over - what else - alcohol and dead historical figures. While the scene certainly had its merits (Daniere and Christensen really did play quite convincing drunkards), the novelty of two grown women stumbling drunk faded quickly for me. I mean, who hasn't seen their parents on New Year's? While I wasn't dazzled by the story Shaffer builds in the second act, my mild disinterest in the plot did give me time to really focus on the acting. I was genuinely impressed by the sheer quantity of lines Daniere was able to memorize and flawlessly deliver. In my last foray into acting, circa fifth grade, I had enough trouble memorizing three lines, while Daniere tackled close to three hours of dialogue with seeming effortlessness. But what I really found myself most hung up on was Christensen's nearly flawless British accent, something which I, after years of trying to imitate Harry Potter, still have not mastered.

While the act itself was a little underwhelming, Schaffer deserves commendations for introducing me to the nearly forgotten 16th century term "quaff," which I interpreted to mean "knock it back." And I do concede that my relative age and more frequent exposure to quaffing may have left me a little desensitized to the true hilarity of the drunken revelry, which really seemed to strike a chord with the rest of the audience. Theatergoer Heidi Huestis, whose sister Robin Huestis was the production's costume designer, found the drunken revelry to be one of the most hilarious spectacles in the show.

If Act II left me in a little bit of a daze, Act III, undoubtedly the comedic high of the play, remedied the situation and left me ultimately with a good taste in my mouth. We learn that Lettice and Lotte have developed an interesting relationship where each week, they reenact an important historical figure's execution complete with real guillotines, axes and execution blocks. Act III is delivered in the form of one particularly catastrophic reenactment that leaves Lotte with an axe lodged in her neck and Lettice charged with attempted murder. The interaction between a distraught Lettice and her court-appointed lawyer, Mr. Bardolph (played by Thomas Jackson), and the altogether unbelievable nature of her terribly true story, reaffirm Shaffer's comic genius.

If its true that all's well that ends well, then I'd have to say that MCP's production of "Lettice and Lovage" was a success. As for Shaffer, I think he may have relied a little too heavily on Dame Maggie Smith's comedic genius to obscure his own shortcomings, particularly in the second act.