Phillyist Reviews... The School for Wives

There's something about a French farce that has real staying power - not in that the play stays with you for days after you see it, but more in that these are plays that have been around for 350 years and are still, somehow, funny.

Sure, there's always the risk that farce can delve into shtick, if the running gags run on too long or if too many people get hit in the face by opening doors or if any other number of farcical cliches are overused. Fortunately, Lantern Theater Company's production of The School for Wives manages to keep the farce light and avoid the cliches.

The cast of five (Joshua L. Browns, Lee Ann Etzold, Joanna Liao, Luigi Sottile, and Greg Wood) runs, stumbles, and sometimes even dances (thank you, Aaron Cromie, for continuing to astound us with your many talents, most recently as the Lantern's choreographer) through Nick Embree's adorably absurd pink set, meant to suggest--but not at all resemble--Seventeenth-Century Paris with such energy that it's immediately clear to all in the audience that this is a cast that's having a good time.

Sure, there were a few directorial choices that were a little questionable (when your main character emerges onstage after intermission and remarks that he's having trouble sitting still, for example, it would serve you well to have him be a bit less jittery in the first act), but these minor flaws were dwarfed by the sheer physicality of the piece: from Wood's mounting exhaustion as he tries to intercept Sottile's pursuit of the young ingenue, to Etzold's brilliant prat falls (and Browns' reaction to them), to the endearingly daft expression on Liao's face. As fantastic as these elements are while the actors are delivering Moliere's scripted verse (as translated by Maya Slater), they're at their best in the balletic, silent-movie inspired, entre-scenes (for lack of a better term) choreographed by Cromie to explain the action happening between scripted moments, and set to minuet-inspired versions of such pop songs as No Doubt's "Don't Speak." It's a concept that works, and it works well, all contributing to a really fun night out at the theatre.

Image via Lantern Theater Company