School For Scandal

It is customary to begin any criticism of a college production with a lament about the difficulty of the row which the cast has chosen to hoe. There seems always to be abundant sympathy of the actors who struggle manfully with their chosen play and at the last succumb, done in by their own ambitions. In selecting School for Scandal for its first production this season, the Harvard Dramatic Club has wisely stifled its ambitions. School for Scandal is not a taxing play, for even when done with mediocrity, it is funny. When it is enhanced with production and acting genius, as it was three years ago by the legitimate Brattle, the play becomes cruel and crisp, satanic in with and snapping in exposition.

The production of the HDC, as you might expect, lies somewhere in between. Its School for Scandal is more than funny. But in this new interpretation, Sheridan's acidity has been neutralized and while several scenes take on an agreeable mellowness, the play suffers. Director Edward Golden, evidently sensing that his most valuable property was Claire Scott's Lady Teazle, has emphasized the true warmth between that lady and her husband from the very beginning. Miss Scott has the ability of making Sheridan's most insulting lines seem a prologue to tenderness. Her Charm alone makes those exchanges between the elevated country girl and her aged husband the high points of the evening.

Contrast Miss Scott's great persuasions against the limitations of the HDC's Lady Sneerwell and you see why the play's balance has been upset. Mary Anne Goldsmith only now and then gives signs of the genuine, luxuriant wickedness which marks Sneerwell. For this wholesale slandering, the production looks to Elinor Fuchs as Mrs. Candour. Looking like a malignant Bea Lillie, Miss Fuchs deals in double-dealing, and very adroitly. Andre Gregory, as the hypocritical Joseph Surface, matches Miss Fuchs' high standard of lowness and holds his own in the fast company of Scandal's College.

Steven Aaron, as a gouty old gossip, is another worthy addition to the destructive drawing room. But once the good tempered malice of Lady Teazle is allowed to take control of the play, the sinner's circle must suffer and with them some of Sheridan's best effects. Though the friendly barbs in the Sneerwell drawing-room provide a vastly enjoyable visit, the play might also have retained its cutting edge to good purpose.

As the turncoat libertine, Charles Surface, D. T. Sullivan tends to fall into the trap of letting the stylized presentation of the play color his performance too much. Charles is a profligate but he would add better conrtast to the play if he were not a fop.

In the roles of the only straightforward characters, Robert Beatey and Beverly Butte make goodness almost as appealing as evil. Beatey plays Lord Teazle and, with Miss Scott as his wife, he has no luck in arousing sympathy in the audience, another sorry stroke against Sheridan.

The setting (John Ratte) and costumes and wigs (Lesile Van Zandt and Helen Gardiner) set the comic tone for a production that rarely slows down. By judiciously picking School for Scandal, the HDC presents a show which can hardly fail to please. Sheridan may have been more entertaining in past productions; the HDC rarely has.