THE RIVALS

LA BÊTE
Directed by Lucy Smith Conroy; written by David Hersin
With: Mark S. Cartier, Nick Gallegos, Caroline Hewitt, Richard Price, Kristala Pouncy, Paul Buxton, Tracie Merrill, Dustin Tucker, Timothy Davis-Reed, and Carmel Javaher
At The Theater At Monmouth in Monmouth, Maine
In repertory from July 29 to August 27

Reviewed by Laurie Meunier Graves

Every so often a theatrical production comes along that is so good, so well acted, and so startling that, as Robertson Davies put it, there is alchemy in the theater. La Bête, performed by The Theater At Monmouth, is such a production, an astonishing but eccentric play that manages to start out as a jaw-dropping comedy but ends as a rather sad meditation on the nature of art and commerce. Such a drastic change of tone often sinks a story, but somehow La Bête, a shrewd yet tender play, manages to avoid this danger, and the results are moving as well as funny.

To put a final, unlikely spin on the play, the entire script was written in verse, not in 1654, when the play is set, but rather in 1992, by David Hersin, a contemporary playwright. There is a pleasing blend of the old style with the new, and as the director, Lucy Smith Conroy, points out in the program booklet, La Bête “sounds like a contemporary English translation of a Molière play.” Yes, it does, and it comes as no surprise to learn that the characters are indeed based on actors in Molière’s company.

When the play opens, Elomire (Mark S. Cartier), the leader of an acting troupe, is fuming to Bejart (Nick Gallegos), his “second in command,” about the proposed addition of Valere (Dustin Tucker) to the company. Elomire’s contempt for Valere is so great that he spits out his invectives with a cold but desperate precision. Because despite what Elomire might think of Valere, Prince Conti (Timothy Davis-Reed), the patron of the troupe, has taken a shine to Valere. Prince Conti insists that Valere should be added to Elomire’s company, and Bejart is urging Elomire to do that very thing. After all, the prince controls the troupe’s purse strings, and without Prince Conti’s support, the troupe would be back on the streets. Elomire knows this, but his vision of theater is so far from Valere’s that there is no middle ground.

As soon as Valere bursts in on Elomire and Bejart, who are in Elomire’s study, the audience can see where the lines are drawn. Elomire is indeed the true artist who cares deeply about his craft, about words and story and the illumination that comes with good art. On the other hand, Valere, with his spiked hair, his mincing steps, and his shrieks, is an ass, by turns boastful and truculent, eager to ingratiate himself into Elomire’s good graces. The fact that it’s a losing battle doesn’t deter the self-centered Valere at all, and he launches into a manic, over-the-top mélange of pressured speech that pretty much takes up the entirety of act one. Dustin Tucker’s performance is a thing to behold, and it almost seems as though he was born to play this part. How anyone can keep up such a steady stream of nonstop chatter is nearly beyond my comprehension. By the end of act one, Tucker was sweating profusely, and no wonder. I was in a complete daze, and all I had to do was listen to him.

Act two brings Prince Conti into the scene. Valere can’t grovel low enough before the prince, and Elomire, against Bejart’s advice, makes it perfectly clear what he thinks of Valere. Prince Conti listens to Elomire’s complaints, but his response is discouraging. Prince Conti believes Elomire’s productions are too serious, too slow, too inaccessible, and what they need is someone like Valere to pep them up. Elomire is aghast but devises a test intended to show how bad Valere really is. The prince has only seen Valere perform in the street, as a whirling-dervish one-man show. Elomire proposes that his whole company put on one of Valere’s plays right then and there in front of the prince. Valere, perhaps not as much of an ass as all that, tries to wheedle out of it, but the prince sides with Elomire, who is convinced that the prince will come to his senses as soon as he sees the show performed by professionals. The troupe is fetched, and the show goes on.

The story, a melodramatic swirl about two brothers, one with talent and one who’s only mediocre, is just about what one would expect from someone like Valere. The action is jumpy, the rhymes are groan worthy, and it rushes to its conclusion like a dog lunging toward a steak bone. Yet, it is funny. It is lively. Accessible, even. And it contains a rather surprising message for such a silly play.

As Valere and Elomire wait for the prince’s verdict, La Bête achieves the nearly impossible. That is, it makes the viewer sympathetic with both men, and Valere is not a man with whom it is easy to sympathize. This generosity is reminiscent of Shakespeare, who seemed to have great sympathy for many of the fools in his play.

La Bête’s success depends primarily on the actors who play Valere, Elomire, and Prince Conti. They represent three different sides of art—the patron, the artist, and the sycophant artist wannabe—but they must also seem as though they are real characters with desires, opinions, and emotions. Without these last three things, nothing would be at stake, and the play would be no more than a silly farce. Fortunately, Dustin Tucker, Mark Cartier, and Timothy Davis-Reed do a terrific job of bringing life to each of their respective characters. (If Dustin Tucker had anymore life, he’d spin right off the stage and crash through the lovely murals on the ceiling of Cumston Hall.) Mark Cartier’s Elomire is absolutely convincing as a man who is dedicated to art and who will not compromise. From his stiff body to his grim face to his eloquent defense of his work, Elomire makes a passionate case for the true artist, and this viewer was squarely on his side. Equally convincing is Timothy Davis-Reed as the prince, a man firmly entrenched in his power and who has no qualms about using it. He is the man with the money, and he will do just what he pleases with it. He’ll listen, but, in the end, his word is law, and like so many patrons, he is someone who likes the idea of theater more than theater itself.

La Bête brilliantly illustrates how the problem of funding art has never been satisfactorily solved. The outcome is the same whether art depends on the patronage of princes or the patronage of the market. In each case, artists are at the whim of outside forces that may or may not be sympathetic to them. Nevertheless, art does find a way, and, as La Bête makes clear, it’s not for the fainthearted. 

 

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