Be sure to bring a dictionary and a copy of Oscar Wilde’s The Importance of Being Earnest with you when you attend the Roundabout Theater Company’s revival of Tom Stoppard’s Travesties. Starring the masterful actor Tom Hollander, the play requires rapt attention. It’s not a play to see at night if you are tired. The lines are often sometimes rapid-fire, and there are jokes and gibes, puns and plays on words. If you aren’t listening carefully, or like me are taking notes, you might miss some gems. Travesties is a memory play as the unreliable narrator, Henry Carr, describes events 50 years after the action supposedly occurred. Hollander gives a wonderfully madcap performance, often scampering across the stage. He preens like a fop and makes outrageously funny faces. As the older man, he tells us his memory is not reliable and he notes that he’s got his wits confused and his “think box is stuck.” Stooped over, clad in his dressing gown and wearing an almost demonic, wild expression, Hollander sets the backdrop. He claims to have worked for the British government in Zurich in 1917. At times, he refers to The Great War and describes his experiences, sometimes with gruesome gory specifics, sometimes in hysterical sartorial detail. During that same time, two revolutionaries, Lenin and James Joyce, lived in Zurich on the same street and Carr claims to have relationships with both of them. ”What was he like? I’m often asked.” For Carr, the relationships with Lenin and Joyce (if they ever really did exist) are less important than is his role as Algernon in James Joyce’s English Players production of The Importance of Being Earnest. Although there’s a backdrop of the war which he refers to in the play, Carr’s obsession with his part as “the other one” in Wilde’s play and his preoccupation with clothing overshadow it and lighten the mood. The play examines the nature of art and the role of the artist. Carr often spars verbally with Joyce and with Tristan Tzara, one of the fathers of Dadaism. They debate and argue about the nature and purpose of war. In one conversation, Carr suggests that wars are fought so artist can ply their art. Tzara, cuts up words of poetry, like from Shakespearean sonnets, puts the pieces in a hat, tosses them and “creates” new poetry. He mocks traditional artists and called his new movement “anti-art.” Carr verbally plays around with the name of the movement (noting its similarity to word “dad”) just as he refers to Joyce as a women’s’ name. The play is often frenetic, adding to its lightheartedness, despite serious topics. Joyce, speaks in limericks, Cecily, Carr’s sister, and Gwendolyn, the librarian, musically joust with one another, and sometimes the action of the play stops as the characters burst out in dance and song. There’s also a witty theatrical device Stoppard employs by repeating the same introductory phase and repeating the scene several times, each time with the conversation going in a different direction (Groundhog Day, anyone?). All three famous characters are revolutionaries in their own way, overthrowing the status quo. Lenin (Dan Butler) and Joyce (Peter McDonald) are fun, often-absurd characters as is Tzara (Seth Numrich) who gets to show real physicality in the role. The revival of the play will challenge your intellect. The Menier Chocolate Factory Production revival has just recently transferred from London where in 2017 it received five Olivier nominations, including Best Actor for Hollander. The language is elegant and beautiful. The references are sometimes obscure. There’s word play, poetry, and even sexual innuendoes. Directed by Olivier-winning director Patrick Marber, Travesties demands attention from its audience. It gives a lot but it moves quickly and intelligently so there’s no dozing off.
