Recent arts coverage:
- At Mexic-Arte Museum, “31K Portraits for Peace” highlights hope
- At AMOA-Arthouse Laguna Gloria, small is the new big
- ‘Failed States:’ Artist-witness creates exhibit in response to shooting at Texas Capitol
- Austin Lyric Opera, music school formally quit
More arts coverage | Follow this blog on Twitter @artsinaustin | Read recent arts reviews
Austin360 blogs > Austin Arts: Seeing Things > Archives > 2010 > June > 01 > Entry
Review: ‘The Wife of Bath’s Tale’
‘Things never change, do they?’ asks an effervescent woman in an oversized hat as she browses through the Cliff Notes to Chaucer?s ?The Canterbury Tales.’
‘It’s always the woman?s fault.’
A new Vortex production of ‘The Wife of Bath’s Tale,’ (adapted by Lorella Loftus and Shekhar Govind, and directed by Karen Jambon) seeks to address this unfairness by letting one of Chaucer?s most famous characters speak for herself.
And speak she does! The Wife of Bath (Loftus) is a vivacious storyteller who regales the audience with bawdy tales of her multiple marriages. Loftus and Govind have tweaked and expanded the text, so that here the Wife of Bath is fragmented into a series of different women throughout time.
As the show opens, a bumbling contemporary version of the Wife of Bath boards a bus to Canterbury and prattles on about her five marriages to her quiet, prim seatmate (Andy Agne).
Other versions of the character include a woman in England in 1707 who addresses her critics, and a schoolteacher in 1918 who teaches a group of female students some of her rules for marriage (which include ‘please for profit’ and ‘assert yourself’).
The Wife of Bath is a fun character — rebellious, lusty, eccentric — and Loftus imbues her with great heart and salty wit. She is also complicated, revealing how she manipulated and dominated some of her former husbands, other times professing to be truly in love.
To guide us through the tale, original illustrations by Ann Marie Gordon flash by on a projection screen, with the occasional live action interlude featuring the silent but highly expressive Agne.
This is primarily a one-person show, and Loftus proves herself to be a lively performer. The production itself still needs a bit more time to gel. Technical kinks need to be worked out, and pacing problems need to be addressed.
These issues didn’t stop the rowdy opening night crowd from interacting with the show, though. Questions like ‘What would priests know about anything anyway?’ were met with cheers and laughter. And as Loftus lifted her glass in a toast ‘To marriage!’ an audience member replied sarcastically, ‘Whatever.
‘The Wife of Bath’s Tale’? continues through June 13, Thursday-Sunday at 8 p.m. The Vortex, 2307 Manor Road. Tickets $10-$30.’ www.vortexrep.org
Claire Canavan is an American-Statesman freelance arts critic.
Comments
When commenting, we ask that you keep things civil and abide by our Visitor Agreement. To report comment abuse, click here.