The Rice Thresher (Houston, Tex.), Vol. 70, No. 12, Ed. 1 Friday, November 5, 1982 Page: 14 of 24
twenty four pages : ill. ; page 20 x 14 in.View a full description of this newspaper.
Extracted Text
The following text was automatically extracted from the image on this page using optical character recognition software:
Theatre
Players boast Southwest premiere of Stoppard farces
Dirty Linen
and New-Found-Land
Rice Players
November 8-13
Ham man Hall
The Rice Players will Derform
for the second time this season
next Monday through Saturday.
The Players are offering two one-
act plays by Tom Stoppard with a
rather unusual format. One of the
two plays, New-Found-Land is
inserted into Dirty Linen. The
plays have nothing to do with each
other, don't have the same cast,
and even had separate directors.
The cleverne^ of Stoppard's
writing as well as close cooperation
between the cast makes the two
mesh together smoothly.
The odd marriage of Dirty
Linen and New-Found-Land is as
After writing Dirty Linen,
Stoppard realized that it had
nothing to do with America, much
less the Bicentennial, so he added
New-Found-Land in the middle.
Neil Havens, the director of thr
Rice Players, directed New-
Found-Land. He feels that what is
most enjoyable about Stoppard is
that the playwright is full of
surprises. The surprise in these
plays is the very unorthodox
structure. The plays and their
characters intersect on the most
minimal level (they share a stage
space), but remain connected to
each other
Havens believes that the play is
enjoyable on a more immediate
level also. "Both of these plays are
verbal farces. Stoppard delights in
playing with language, and so we
Ployers present Stoppard one-acts in Hamman.
old as the plays themselves. Tom delight in the words along with
Stoppard was asked to write a play
about America's Bicentennial.
him."
Although the plays are set in the
The Jalapeno Tree is open from 12 noon until 10:00PM on
Sundays, serving hamburgers, chicken fried steak,salads,
tortillas, enchiladas, nachos and french
fries worth leaving home for.
Best of all, show your UH
or Rice student ID card and
get 15% off your Sunday meal.
It's our way of supporting
higher education and bigger
appetites. hot food. hot music.
cold drinks.
a
<s
webster: 316 NASA Blvd., 332-5502 houston: 5935 Kirby, 529-7645
British Houses of Parliament,
Havens feels that Rice students
will have no difficulty in relating to
it. "It's not really about
Parliament. It's a sex farce. It's the
kind of play that theatre audiences
have enjoyed since the Italian
comdedia deirarte."
Dirty Linen is being directed by
a Rice student and member of the
Rice Players coordinating board,
Gary Meade. Working with this
split play has been relatively
trouble-free for him, thanks to a
good cast. The technical problems
have been few—there are no set
changes and the costumes are
mostly the actors' own clothes.
The hardest job for him as a
director has been to help the actors
develop a British sense of humor
and timing. "Even the British
linguistics, like Hal Kohlman's
Lancastrian accent, are difficult."
Meade has had a dialogue coach
(Gail Elverd, who acted in the
Player's production of Major
Barbara) which has helped greatly.
Meade agrees with Havens that
the main selling point of the play is
the sex. Meade describes the
Stoppard one-acts as "Bedroom
farce that takes place in a drawing
Hamman Hall, at 8 p.m. every
night. Tickets may be reserved by
room.
The Stoppard plays run
Monday through Saturday in
calling Hamman Hall at 527-4040.
Reservations are advised.
—Deborah L. Knaff
Winslow Boy likeable despite script
The Winslow Boy
The Channing Players
Directed by Janis Halliday
You could call The Winslow
Boy, by Terence Rattigan, a witless
bit of piffle. You got yer crusty old
English father. You got yer rakish,
layabout older son. You got yer
plucky, sufragette older daughter.
You got yer pale, pity-inspiring
younger son, victim of the cold,
impersonal British military
bureaucracy. You got yer comic-
relief maid. And so on. For all that,
though, the Channing Players give
a skilled performance and create
an atmosphere of sympathy for the
valiant characters.
Plot: Ronnie ("The Winslow
Boy") Winslow arrives back from
the Naval Academy weeks early
and unannounced. Consternation
about the household; futile
attempts to hide the truth from the
father, Arthur. The truth: the boy's ••
been accused and found guilty of
stealing five shillings from a postal
order. Inevitably, father finds out;
to Ronnie's surprise, his cries of
innocence are believed. Battle
ensues between father and military
establishments. Family considera-
tionns fall by the wayside. Conflict
escalates to level of the House of
Commons. Finally (surprise!) a
decision is reached in the Court—
the boy is innocent! Hurrah,
hurrah, sigh.
For all the emptiness of the plot,
the Channing Players made a
success of the production, a success
due primarily to the level of acting
throughout. Elyce Picciotti
portrays the self-determined and
sharp-witted character of
Catherine Winslow, the older
daughter; she has a confederate in
Sir Robert Morton, a lawyer
initially lizardlike in his lack of
emotion but who, as the play
progresses, achieves a state of
masked compassion—played by
Mike Evans, his becomes the other
standout portrayal of the
production. These two characters
strike the viewer so strongly
because they change throughout
the course of the play—Sir Morton
as detailed above, and Catherine in
that she, while maintaining her
strong ideals, becomes able to
We'll give you a whole
year's worth
of good looks
With Redken" Design Prescription, a totally
new concept in beauty makeovers. We'll give
you an exciting new look and show you how
to update it to be more beautiful all year long.
Call for your personal consultation today.
&REDKEN
Salon Prescription Center
By DON
HAIR +
Phone 526-HAIR 2017 Westheimer
Houston, Ttxas 77098
men & women haircuts 20% discount
with student ID
accept the fact that her husband-
to-be is an opportunist ruled by the
desire for money and that Sir
Morton is not.
On the other end of the
spectrum, Dennis Beckman as
Dickie Winslow acts as a
disruption to the suspension of
disbelief instilled in the audience
by the rest of the cast: he seems
simply out of place in the late
1800s. As the father, Arthur
Winslow, Ted Lofton does an
acceptable job, yet while the
character undergoes great change,
most obviously from good health
to life as an invalid in a wheelchair,
his interpretation remains static.
While his part is a minor one,
mention should go to Kennon
Baird, who does a fine job of
playing the pompous, ineffuctual
lawyer John Watherstone; the
viewer actually feels sympathy for
the man.
The play flowed along
smoothly, tempo accelerating
when necessary to draw the
audience in to the action; as the
Winslow Boy is high on discussion
and low on action, pacing is an
absolute requirement, and Janis
Halliday's skillful direction
provides crisp movement. Both the
costumes (designed by Dale
Beverly) and the set (designed by
Don Williams) evoke Britain in the
late 1800s and add considerably to
th^,production's flavour.
While this whole review has
been an excercise in futility, as the
play's run ended Saturday, the
point is this: working with weak,
predictable material (as you may
have determined, The Winslow
Boy has not gone heralded through
the years as one of the greatest
efforts of dramatic writing) ^he
Channing Players are able to hold
the viewers attention, and the
production is, all elements
considered, a superior one. With a
more ambitious choice of material,
their future presentations should
merit attention.
— Ray Isle
The Rice Thresher, November 5, 1982, page 14
Upcoming Pages
Here’s what’s next.
Search Inside
This issue can be searched. Note: Results may vary based on the legibility of text within the document.
Tools / Downloads
Get a copy of this page or view the extracted text.
Citing and Sharing
Basic information for referencing this web page. We also provide extended guidance on usage rights, references, copying or embedding.
Reference the current page of this Newspaper.
Morgan, Tom. The Rice Thresher (Houston, Tex.), Vol. 70, No. 12, Ed. 1 Friday, November 5, 1982, newspaper, November 5, 1982; Houston, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth245514/m1/14/: accessed July 18, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu.; crediting Rice University Woodson Research Center.