Patate

Irwin Shaw has taken Patate from the French of Marcel Achard, and he would be well advised to put it back. As a laugh show, this "New Comedy" suffers from a paucity of laughs. And since the script is not a gimmick adorned by gags, in the fashion of most American comedies, but a closely plotted dramatic whole, there seems very little possibility of its being rewritten and rescued by skillful gagsmithing.

As a (somewhat) serious comedy, Patate's ailments are more complicated. That closely plotted plot deals with two men whose relationship bears many points of resemblance to that subsisting between Gladstone Gander and Donald Duck. Donald is the hero of the play the "patate" (helpfully defined in the program as "schmoe; patsy; fall guy.") It turns out, however, that his primary concern for several decades has been to nourish vengeful, bitter (and, admittedly, not unjustified) hatreds against his rich "friend," meanwhile nourishing himself by borrowing the friend's money. The patate is presented as a sweet guy, but in spite of the fact that he really is a patate, he is quite evidently more interested in doing dirt to ol' Gladstone than in doing good to any-body.

The discovery that his daughter has been seduced diverts him for a while from his idee fixe, and he rants and mourns like a character out of Dumas fils. There is some talk about his ordering the errant one out of his house, and then a while later he observes lugubriously, "You have just given me the greatest sorrow of my life." Of course the daughter has not selected just anybody to perform the act of darkness with, and we are treated to the unveiling of the structure of interlocking copulations which is usual in second-rate French drama. We also get a good helping of the sort of dialogue that too often accompanies it: "Forgive me for being so intimate with your husband...Can you imagine, there was a time when I was mad about your husband. Absolutely mad."

In America, promiscuity seems to be taken both more and less seriously than it is in France. I will leave the ramifications of this statement to any sociologist who may be interested, only recommending that he research Patate because its whole ambience is so unmistakably French. This particular production, however, will offer them little help, largely because Tom Ewell of Owens-boro, Kentucky, is playing the patate. Mr. Ewell, as usual, makes funny faces that are both expressive and unstrained. He handles the role well enough otherwise, but his comic talents do not get much play. Lee Bowman acts Gladstone, and Haila Stoddard (substituting for Nancy Wickwire) and Murial Williams play various wives. All are competent. As the unchaste ingenue, who is never quite as interesting a character as the author seems to expect, Susan Oliver is, if nothing else, astonishingly beautiful. It might almost be worth going to see Patate (there's plenty of room at the Colonial these days, by the way) just to admire Miss Oliver. There is little else to admire.