'Earnest' stresses importance of being funny

0 Comments | Oakland Tribune, Aug 19, 2004 | by Chad Jones, STAFF WRITER

AS much as we love old Shakespeare, it's always such a relief when the California Shakespeare Theater takes a break from the Bard.

Last summer we got George Bernard Shaw, and this summer we get Oscar Wilde, whose "The Importance of Being Earnest" is so smart and funny that even Shakespeare would likely be amused and impressed.

Considered one of the best comedies ever written, "Earnest" can be worthwhile even if the production of it is abysmal. Wilde's cleverness, wit and unerring sense of structure can rise above most brands of theatrical ineptitude.

What a delight, then, to report that director Jonathan Moscone and a marvelous cast of Bay Area actors bring depth and feeling to Wilde's already sparkling comedy, making it as emotionally rich and satisfying as it is hilarious.

In typical Moscone fashion, this is the kind of production where music cues in Bill Williams' sound design can range from a dance band "Stompin' at the Savoy" to David Bowie's "Modern Love" without making you scratch your head.

This is also an "Earnest" in which the sharp, briskly paced comedy bumps up against grandly romantic gestures -- along with a few extremely corny ones -- and it all works.

Moscone uses Wilde's three-act structure to slowly strip away the artifice of the play.

In the London bachelor's apartment of Act 1, set designer Kate Edmunds renders backdrops in black and white and provides splashes of red in the Persian rugs, the velvet of the pool table and the glow of Arabian lamps.

For the country garden of Act 2, she removes most of the backdrop and lets the hills and green trees of Orinda do the work. Only a panel of grayish clouds, a white chaise lounge and a pink garden table and chairs fill the Bruns Memorial Amphitheater stage.

When the absurdity and romance peak in Act 3, the stage is bare except for an enormous portrait of Wilde himself. Moscone wisely trains our focus on the characters and on Wilde's wordplay. There's simply no need of anything else.

Stylish without being overly bold, this "Earnest" is filled with engaging performances. Never mind that most of the actors are a good decade too old or too young. They really get the play, and that's what counts.

Andy Murray is an unlikely Algernon Moncrieff. With the face and body of a boxer, Murray brings some earthy gusto to a role that is usually played in much too dandyish a fashion. The fussiness is left to Anthony Fusco as Jack Worthing, a tightly wound fop with a penchant for lying about his fictional brother Ernest.

Fusco really is the heart of this production. His Jack zings from one emotion to the next -- smug man about town to smitten puppy dog to irate parental figure -- and makes us believe every one of them.

As Jack's betrothed, Julie Eccles as Gwendolen Fairfax is, to quote Wilde, "right as a trivet." She's sturdy, fiery and as crisply funny as she needs to be. Her big city elan is beautifully contrasted by the country charms of Susannah Schulman's Cecily Cardew, the woman who steals Algernon's wily heart.

Schulman matches Murray's vitality heartbeat for heartbeat, joke for joke. She swoons, she sprints, she stands up for herself. And when she and Murray kiss, it's in a very enthusiastic way that the British call "snogging."

There's no insignificant role in "Earnest" because Wilde has structured it so expertly. That's why the strong support from Nancy Carlin as a secretly randy Miss Prism, L. Peter Callender as a bouncy Rev. Canon Chasuble and Clive Worsley as a series of butlers is so very welcome.

Domenique Lozano is far too young to play the imperious Lady Bracknell, a society matron who could stop a train with the word "handbag." And though her comparative youth works against her, Lozano inhabits the role ably and communicates the humor if not the hauteur of the character.

Lovely to look at, thanks in part to Katherine Roth's slightly exaggerated costumes, and thoroughly enjoyable, Cal Shakes' The Importance of Being Earnest" is well worth a jaunt to Orinda. To paraphrase Van Morrison, "Oh, the Wilde night is calling."

You can e-mail Chad Jones at cjones@angnewspapers.com or call (925) 416-4853.