Love and lust at the National Gallery of Art

John Everett Millais (1829-96). Ophelia, 1851-52. Tate. Presented by Sir Henry Tate, 1894.

Ophelia is probably the most popular of the works in the current exhibition at the National Gallery of Art, modeled after Shakespeare's Ophelia in Hamlet, and to draw her correctly, the artist had a model lie in a bathtub which he warmed with oil lamps but worked so diligently, he forgot when the lamps went out, the model got sick, and never recovered.

And there's lots more to see at the National Gallery of Art.

Love, lust, triangles, passion, prostitutes, virtue, mysterious deaths, and a monster snake to name just a few subjects, are to be found in the stunning Pre-Raphaelites exhibition at the West Building, but only for a few precious days more.

The show ends Sunday.

It's another of those fantastic Gallery displays which you want to stay forever. Rather like a glorious sunset or a perfect day in April, you want to capture and relive the experience of enjoyment over and over.  It's a fantasy ride, one I've taken six times and may get in another one before Monday.

And it's not only art, but lots of literature, drama and religious subjects that enrich each of the eight galleries, filled with productions created by the "Pre-Raphaelites," a gang of seven Brits who broke with tradition in 1848 and rebelled against the rigid classicism of Raphael (1483-1520) and Michelangelo (1475-1564) whose art they were supposed to use as models for their own.

This brotherhood drew nature with painstaking detail, spent hours outdoors, drawing on riverbanks to ensnare every last fold in each blade of grass, who returned to the classics and romanticism for themes they admired and wanted to explore. They embellished historical scenes, many with a Victorian flavor, and who’s not to enjoy anything Victorian? 

For inspiration they often relied upon Shakespeare, Tennyson, and Wordsworth whose works they combined with a fascination with medieval themes that would divide them later. 

Their productions unleashed Britain's first avant-garde art movement, pieces from it on display in the U.S., only at the National Gallery of Art.

According to just about everybody, the mid-19th century was "an era of vast political and social change.” (Prithee, name an era which is free of “vast political and social change.")

This group of poets, critics, and artists included the three founders, William Holman Hunt, John Everett Millais and Dante Gabriel Rossetti, and later, William Michael Rossetti, James Collinson, Frederic George Stephens, and Thomas Woolner.

Some of them attended classes at the Royal Academy of the Arts, founded by Sir Joshua Reynolds, whom they called "Sir Sloshua."

Greeting visitors in the first gallery is the astonishing and revolutionary work by John Everett Millais, Christ in the House of His Parents (1849-1850) for which you should allow several minutes to study its complexities.  (Stand your ground when the next viewer tries with body language to push you aside.)

When it was first exhibited, the painting drew widespread criticism and some considered it blasphemous. Charles Dickens (yes, that Charles Dickens), said Millais made the Holy Family look like alcoholics and slum-dwellers, who posed in strange and ridiculous ways. The catalogue quotes Dickens:

Mary was "so horrible in her ugliness...a Monster, in the vilest cabaret in France...."

The charming and red-headed, blue-eyed Christ Child stands in the center of his father’s carpentry shop with his mother on knees offering him her cheek and comfort for his hand has been cut by a nail.  Blood drips upon his large foot. Joseph and John the Baptist, shyly carrying water, stand with others in a Trinity design around the table.  Millais's portrait of John's expression of sorrow and trepidation is distinctive in its composition and  magnificence, one to admire for the ages.

Debate about the painting created so much turbulence, Queen Victoria requested to view it privately at Buckingham Palace.

John Everett Millais. Christ in the House of His Parents (The Carpenter's Shop), 1849-50. Tate. Purchased with assistance from the Art Fund and various subscribers, 1921.

Then there was the love triangle between Millais, the art critic John Ruskin, and Ruskin's wife, Effie, who all took off on a trip to Scotland together in 1853, so Millais could paint Ruskin, who was much an avant-garde himself, for unlike many of his contemporaries, Ruskin offered praise instead of attacks on the Brotherhood's presentations.

Effie had served as the female subject for Millais in his The Order of Release 1746, about the Battle of Culloden, which Millais completed the year of the trip to Scotland. Three males and a dog, likely a male, too, surround a woman whose face is the only one to appear in its entirety.  She exudes confidence and strength, welcoming her husband home, and hands the guard a note.  Has she traded her virtue for her husband's release? The painting created an uproar and drew huge crowds which increased interest in the Brotherhood, for like any communicator can tell you:  Nothing builds traffic like controversy.

John Everett Millais, The Order of Release 1746 (1852-53). Tate. Presented by Sir Henry Tate, 1898.

Speaking of...

Without any satisfaction to find in the marital bedroom over the years, Effie turned to a nearby resource and grew increasingly attached to Millais. A year after the trip to Scotland she cited as her reason for annulment of her six-year marriage, lack of consummation, while Ruskin told his attorney that her female body disgusted him. (!) (He did try to forge another marriage later, only to be rebuffed when the bride-to-be consulted Effie.)

Well!  You can imagine the public’s response (and interest), and talk about scandal. Hell hath no fury like a man scorned.

 In 1855 Effie and Millais got married and had eight children in the first 13 years of their marriage, however, her ex and his venom on paper continually spewed harsh criticism of Millais's work. (What a surprise.)

Just a couple of years later found Millais painting Effie’s younger (by 15 years) sister, Sophie, and you cannot look at her portrait (in the show) and escape the infatuation and adoration of the artist for his subject. She is about ready to pucker up and blow him a kiss or plant one on his lips. A pretty good effect, no? Yes, Sophie may have felt a mutual warmth for her brother-in-law. "Take me," she seems to say. Later, she developed anorexia nervosa which preceded mental illness, all experienced before a marriage in 1873 to a man not liked by her family.  Her only child, a daughter, was 8 years old when her mother died at age 38 in 1882.

John Everett Millais, Sophie Gray (1857). Private collection c/o Christie's.  

What else?  The exhibition is much more than Millais. I just seem to be hung up on him.

In Jesus Washing Peter's Feet, 1852-56 by Ford Madox Brown (1821-93), Jesus was initially drawn shirtless, but the people demanded his chest be covered, and they got it. 

All this and much more in the exhibition and 250+ page catalogue which describes and reproduces many of the 130 paintings on full pages of color, along with the sculptures, books, photographs, and decorative objects in the show. (Would you believe there's a gift shop at the end?)

Alexander Munro, 1825-71. Josephine Butler, 1855. Marble. The Mistress and Fellows of Girton College Cambridge. The label says "Josephine Butler was a social reformer and advocate for women's rights.  Her deep religious convictions, charismatic persona, and rhetorical skill made her a compelling public speaker."

Alexander Munro.  Young Romilly. c. 1863. Marble. Scottish National Gallery, Edinburgh.  Purchased 1993.  The label says this work is "among the most successful treatments of nature in Pre-Raphaelite sculpture....The subject comes from William Wordsworth's poem 'The Force of Prayer' (1807):

Young Romilly through Barden woods

Is ranging high and low;

And holds a greyhound in a leash,

To let slip upon buck or doe."

I dare say, some Washington, D.C. residents might want to rent the eager greyhound.

While at the exhibition, do not, do not overlook the frames which hold the paintings. Stand back and admire their design, and the complements to the pictures they make.

A docent, who has visited the exhibition four times, and I celebrated our Pre-Raph joy at an information counter Wednesday. If you think my descriptions about this show are exaggerated, do let me know, and I'll refund your admission charge.

Oh!  And there is British fare on the menu at the Gallery's Garden Café, including an English cheese board, "bubble and squeak," Cornish pastry, and Sherry Trifle.

The curator, Diane Waggoner, the Gallery's associate curator of photographs, said the exhibition, organized by Tate Britain with the National Gallery, was five years in the making, but its breadth and collection from around the world suggest a production of far more years.

Said Dr. Waggoner:  It was appropriate for the art of the past to shape the art of the future. Amen, brothers.  And, amen, sisters.

Hour-long Gallery talks about the exhibition begin at 1 p.m. at the Rotunda in the West Building on May 16 and 17.  About 50 attended the talk on Wednesday.


What: Pre-Raphaelites: Victorian Art and Design, 1848–1900, and the books

When: Now through May 19, 2013, 10 a.m. - 5 p.m., Monday through Saturday, and 11 a.m. - 6 p.m., Sunday

Where: Main floor, the West Building, National Gallery of Art, 4th at Constitution, NW, Washington, D.C.

Admission: No charge

Metro stations: Smithsonian, Federal Triangle, Navy Memorial-Archives, or L'Enfant Plaza

For more information: 202-737-4215

The people wait for entry to the Pre-Raphaelites at the West Building of the National Gallery of Art.  That's a banner of Millais's (again!) Mariana, 1850-51/Patricia Leslie

patricialesli@gmail.com

Escape with American Pre-Raphaelites at the National Gallery of Art

 
William John Hennessy, Mon Brave, 1870, oil on board, Brooklyn Museum, New York, Purchased with Funds given by the Rembrandt Club. This is reminiscent of the works by the British Pre-Raphaelites who were featured in a show at the National Gallery in 2013. Here, the woman mourns her lover, lost to perhaps the American Civil War or the Franco-Prussian War (1870-1871). The artist, according to the label copy, made this to aid French peasants and includes a memorial cross and wreath with the French "mon brave" ("my brave one") and an iris flower, associated with France. The catalogue recognizes also the symbolism of the laurel leaves on top of the portrait for the soldier's heroism, the white roses included for chastity and love, the forget-me-nots, "lasting devotion." I must admit, at first glance her flowing locks were all I saw, thinking she was kissing herself in a mirror!The catalogue notes she almost appears hypnotized "reinforcing the underlying necrophiliac mood." Note the streaming window treatment continues the mood flow.

Aaron Draper Shattuck, The Shattuck Family, with Grandmother, Mother and Baby William, 1865 oil on canvas, Brooklyn Museum, New York, Given in memory of Mary and John D. Nodine, by Judith and Wilbur Ross, Here is the artist's mother and wife with their firstborn in the parlor of their summer home in Great Barrington, Massachusetts which the artist uses to convey the sanctity of a home during war. Paintings on the wall reemphasize his message in this work which omits the father, off to war Beneath the painting in the painting on the right (you have to see the original whose colors are more vibrant than seen here) is a rosary, the catalogue notes, unusual to be found in a Protestant home but which may belong to Mr. Shattuck's friend, the poet, Fitz-James O'Brien, killed in 1862 in the Civil War fighting for the Union. The catalogue notes Mr. Shattuck may have been influenced by Gone, Gone below.

Fidelia Bridges, Laura Brown in a Wingchair, 1867 oil on canvas, High Museum of Art, Atlanta, Purchase with American Art Acquisitions Fund. Laura Brown's figure seems much too small for the surroundings, especially the chair which seems to swallow her. The lighting on the carpet does not appear to match the shadows cast by the sun. This is one of six works by Ms. Bridges in the exhibition, the only works by a woman in the display.

Thomas Charles Farrer, Sketching from Nature, 1861, pen and black and brown ink on paper, cut into the shape of an arch, National Gallery of Art, Washington, John Davis Hatch Collection. Image courtesy of the Board of Trustees, National Gallery of Art, Washington. In addition to his brother, Henry, who has several works in the show, Thomas's wife, Annie R. McLane, was an artist, too, but without representation in the show.

Thomas C. Farrer, Self-Portrait, Sketching, c. 1859, pencil on tan paper with Chinese white, lent by Mr. and Mrs. Stuart P. Feld. Several works in this exhibition are by Mr. Farrer who was Mr. Ruskin's student at Working Men's College in London before Mr. Farrer immigrated to the U.S. in 1858.  At age 19, Mr. Farrer made this of himself sitting in his boarding house in New York City.  The catalogue says Mr. Farrer was likely influenced by Jan van Eyck's Arnolfini Portrait which probably reflects the artist's image in a mirror and which was added to the London National Gallery in 1842.

Thomas C. Farrer, Gone! Gone!, 1860, oil on canvas, The Hon. William Gibson. The title and label copy tell the story behind this work painted just before the outbreak of the Civil War. A window opens onto the Hudson River behind the lady, and behind her is a painting of parting lovers by John Everett Millais which served as the model for Farrer's sad testimony to conflict.

John Ruskin, Fragment of the Alps, c. 1854–1856, watercolor and gouache over graphite on cream wove paper, Harvard Fogg Museum, Cambridge, Gift of Samuel Sachs. This is one of Mr. Ruskin's most celebrated works and shows his fascination with geology which he studied from childhood. He "firmly believed that the secrets of divine creation were contained in the rocky crevices and fissures of the earth," says catalogue copy. He was not the only artist intrigued by geology as illustrated by several works in the American Exhibition of British Art  of 1857-1858 in New York and Philadelphia. Rocks became the source of inspiration and subjects on canvas and paper and commanded much attention among these artists. many who were Mr. Ruskin's mentees.  Do you think they would support fracking if they were alive today?  See the youth below studying Mr. Ruskin's masterpiece today at the National Gallery.

 Ruskin's Fragment of the Alps attracts 21st century artists, too, July 9, 2019 at the National Gallery of Art/Photo by Patricia Leslie

Henry Farrer, Winter Scene in Moonlight, 1869, watercolor and gouache on white wove paper, Lent by The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Purchase, Morris K. Jessup Fund, Martha and Barbara Fleischman, and Katherine and Frank Martucci Gifts, 1999. The catalogue has little to say about Winter Scene, the artist's earliest landscape watercolor. which seems oddly out of place, sharing space with flowers and verdant nature likenesses. Winter Scene reminds me of Nordic countries and the Phillips Collection's recent show, Nordic Impressions. Indeed, the wall copy says this nighttime scene is unusual for the American Pre-Raphaelites and may be a drawing of Brooklyn which was still rural where the artist, the younger brother of Thomas Farrer, lived. The brothers have several works in the exhibition.

William Trost Richards, In The Woods, 1860, oil on canvas, Bowdoin College Museum of Art, Brunswick, Gift of Miss Mary T. Mason and Miss Jane Mason

Fidelia Bridges, Study of Ferns, 1864, oil on board, New Britain Museum of American Art, Gift of Jean E. Taylor. Ms. Bridges is the only female artist represented in the show which has six of her works on display.

William Trost Richards, Landscape, c. 1863–1864, oil on canvas, Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art. This is the museum founded by Alice Walton, daughter of the Walmart founder, Sam Walton, which is located at the birthplace and headquarters of Walmart in Bentonville, Arkansas.  Admission is free. I inferred from the wall copy that a critic's condescending remarks indicated his belief this was not worthy f Mr. Richards's inclusion in respectable artists' circles, but perhaps I am overly critical of the critic.

William Trost Richards, Path in the Woods, 1861, oil on canvas, private collection.

Henry Roderick Newman, 1843-1917, The Temple Door at Abu Simbel, 1900, watercolor, private collection. Here the artist depicts the temple of Ramses II at Abu Simbel in Nubia on the Upper Nile

Henry Roderick Newman, Ramleh, 1893, watercolor on paper, private collection. Ramleh, now a neighborhood in Alexandria, Egypt, was formerly a fashionable resort where Mr. Newman and his wife wintered almost every year beginning in 1887.  After his first trip to Europe in 1870, they settled in Florence in 1874 where their home became a center for artists and tourists.  His Egyptian drawings commanded respectable audiences. If Egyptian art seems out of place here, Mr. Newman was the "last Ruskinian" and, as the wall copy says, the American Pre-Raphaelites "traded picturesque conventions for a quasi-scientific precision that was also charged with spiritual significance."  I still don't get it other than Mr. Newman was a Ruskin student and Mr. Newman liked Egypt and there you have it.  (I like Egypt, too, and that's why these are included here.)  Also, I believe Mr. Ruskin traveled several times to Mr. Newman's studio in Florence. Mr. Newman was also one of the "first significant American painters" to work in Florida.  He was born in Easton, NY. 

With the American Pre-Raphaelites: Radical Realists and the Egyptians at the National Gallery of Art/Photo by Patricia Leslie
If ever I need a respite from Washington's heat, the National Gallery of Art is a perfect place to find escape and cool down amidst greenery and flowers in paintings by American Pre-Raphaelites: Radical Realists which hang on the walls for a few days more on the ground floor of the West Building.

Like most of the exhibitions at the National Gallery, I want them all to stay so I can return and see the art anew. Especially for the Pre-Raphaelites, whether they are American, who are in the galleries now, or the British who came in 2013.

Whatever does "pre-Raphaelite" mean? Wikipedia says it much better than I:

The group's intention was to reform art by rejecting what it considered the mechanistic approach first adopted by Mannerist artists who succeeded Raphael and Michelangelo. Its members believed the Classical poses and elegant compositions of Raphael in particular had been a corrupting influence on the academic teaching of art, hence the name "Pre-Raphaelite."

The sub-title of this show, Radical Realists, certainly does not conform to contemporary definition of radical, but in the 19th century, they were "radical," we are told.

From the rocks of the Alps to woody wanderings to Egyptian palm trees and monuments, you can lose yourself and travel to faraway places on these walls.
 
The  hardbound catalogue ($65) by curators Linda S. Ferber of the New York Historical Society and Nancy K. Anderson of the National Gallery has 312 pages and 210 color illustrations, with photos and brief biographical notes about the artists and patrons. Save $20 on a $100 purchase.

What: American Pre-Raphaelites: Radical Realists 

When: Now through July 21, 2019, 10 a.m. - 5 p.m., Monday through Saturday, and 11 a.m. - 6 p.m., Sunday

Where: Ground floor, the West Building, National Gallery of Art, 4th at Constitution, NW, Washington, D.C.

Admission: No charge

Metro stations: Smithsonian, Federal Triangle, Navy Memorial-Archives, or L'Enfant Plaza

For more information: 202-737-4215

patricialesli@gmail.com

New moderns at the National Gallery of Art spark passions

Richard Artschwager, Piano/Piano, 1963-65/2011. National Gallery of Art, Washington, Gift of the Collectors Committee/Patricia Leslie

Please, National Gallery of Art, throw a party with these artists and invite me. 

 
Four of the five are still living, and one's a woman.

Even for die-hard anti-moderns (I know a few), these new pieces, made possible at the National Gallery by its Collectors Committee, are worth a look, especially when you know a little something about the creators, like Hans Haacke (b. 1936 in Cologne) a leading political artist, whose specialities involve kinetic art, who helped birth institutional critique, or Ed Ruscha (b. 1937, Omaha) whose Stains (1969) include gun powder, cherry pie, and daffodils among 75 ingredients spread on different paper sheets.

The Collectors Committee has also acquired for the Gallery Piano/Piano,  1963-65/2011, by Washington's own Richard Ernest Artschwager (1923-2013) whose furniture business background helped steer him to artistic success.

The newest Artschwager consists of two laminated wooden pianos which intermingle in passionate embrace, an example of "synthetic cubism," according to the National Gallery, and on view in the East Building inside the interior "sculpture garden" near the Small Auditorium. Atschwager completed the piece for an exhibition last year in Rome.

Other new works come from Rineke Dijkstra (b. 1959, Sittard, Netherlands), the first of her achievements for the National Gallery, and Allan McCollum (b. 1944, Los Angeles) whose Plaster Surrogates, 1982/1989  (not on display yet), has toured the world.

McCollum is a self-taught artist who created his early works in a California storefront and then a parking garage after he tried acting, restaurant management, truck driving, and building crates for a West Hollywood art company where he mingled with art dealers, collectors and artists.  They influenced his artistic development and his direction into "quantity production." McCollum resonates with the history and development of local communities and their relationship to their particular geographies, as well.

Meanwhile, Haacke’s Condensation Wall, 1963-66/2013, stands in prominent position at the foot of the East Building’s main floor staircase. This example of minimal sculpture  and kinetic art becomes "a micro-environment contingent with its surrounding." Water collects and drops inside the sculpture, depending upon the temperature of the building, with the entire natural process and nearby art works visible through Condensation's transparent walls.

Hans Haacke, Condensation Wall, 1963-1966/2013. National Gallery of Art, Washington. Gift of the Collectors Committee/Patricia Leslie.  Behind Condensation Wall is Richard Serra's Five Plates, Two Poles, 1971, and Robert Motherwell's Reconciliation Elegy, 1978, another gift from the Collectors Committee.

 

 

One of Haacke's most famous works and an early example of institutional critique, Shapolsky et al. Manhattan Real Estate Holdings, A Real Time Social System, as of May 1, 1971, was his attack upon a slum landlord in New York which caused  the cancellation of his solo show at the Guggenheim and the firing of its curator. (Ten years later it went up at the Museum of Contemporary Art in New York.)

 
Powerful stuff, huh?

But back to D.C.'s Artschwager.  His mother studied at the Corcoran School of Art and helped develop her son's artistic interests, now associated with minimalism, pop and conceptual art.

He graduated from Cornell, married, and worked as a furniture salesman, then later a furniture designer.  Artschwager's future took a right turn after he received a commission from the Catholic Church in 1960 to "build portable altars for ships."  This production led to his use of wood and Formica to make small wall pieces and to larger objects.

Dijkstra is a photographer whose video, I See a Woman Crying (Weeping Woman), 2009, is based on Picasso's The Weeping Woman, 1937, which is not seen or labled in this piece.  Rather, Dijkstra's subject is Catholic school children who respond to Picasso's Woman on three screens. And it's on display in the West Building through Labor Day, September 2, 2013.   

Ed Ruscha, another artist associated with the Pop movement, says he was inspired by Jasper Johns, Arthur Dove, Marcel Duchamps, and John Everett Millais's Ophelia which, coincidentally, hangs in the Gallery's West Building through May 19, part of the enthralling Pre-Raphaelites exhibition.  (Don't miss it!)

The people wait for entry outside the West Building. The enlarged reproduction is John Everett Millais's Marianna, 1850-1851, one of the artists who inspired Ed Ruscha.  Many Millais paintings may be found in the West Building, part of the Pre-Raphaelites exhibition/Patricia Leslie 

Influenced by Hollywood films, Ruscha's art direction stems also from his training in commercial art, words and typography. His Words in Their Best Order, 2002, is a "site-specific" work of three panels, each 13 x 23 feet, found at the Gannett Building in Tysons Corner.

It's not easy to make out Ed Ruscha's Words in Their Best Order, 2002, at the Gannett Building at Tysons Corner, Virginia, but look closely (very closely) and the words may appear through the windows/Patricia Leslie

Ruscha has experimented with the use of gunpowder, vinyl, blood, red wine, fruit and vegetable juice, axle grease, chocolate syrup, tomato paste, bologna, cherry pie, coffee, caviar, daffodils, tulips, raw eggs and grass stains.

Would you not leap at an opportunity to meet these artists? I think I fell in love with Haacke, and I don't even know what he looks like, but what do looks matter when his art revolution can shut down an exhibition? He is the people's power Putin of the art world today. I wonder if he rides horses topless. 

Wikipedia quotes Ruscha: "Art has to be something that makes you scratch your head." After viewing these stimulations, you may not have any head hair left, but art is not a passive fancy, and aims to stimulate or please somebody, maybe, whether it's you or the artist. (Call me, maybe.)

What: Modern Art

When:  10 a.m. - 5 p.m., Monday - Saturday and 11 a.m. - 6 p.m., Sunday

Where: The East (Haacke, Ruscha) and West (Dijkstra), National Gallery of Art, between Third and Ninth streets, N.W., Washington, D.C.

How much:  Admission is always free at the National Gallery of Art

Metro stations:  Archives-Navy Memorial, Judiciary Square, the Smithsonian, or L'Enfant Plaza

For more information:  202-737-4215

patricialesli@gmail.com

Folger's 'Twelfth Night' rocks Capitol Hill

At Folger's Theatre's Twelfth Night, Richard Sheridan Willis is Malvolio who tries to learn how to smile while James Konicek as Sir Andrew Aguecheek spies on him. Willis's performance is worthy of a Helen Hayes Award nomination/Scott Suchman 
 

It was the most enjoyable Shakespeare I have seen.

Bar none.

Hands down.

No exaggeration.

Twelfth Night at the Folger Theatre is a hit, a lark, a delight, and everyone feels good at the end, including the gal in my row who caught the bridal bouquet and squealed like a little piggy with several of her friends. And I would have squealed, too.

It's a fantastic ride in a land of make-believe, built on the shipwreck of the Lusitania from World War I in the kingdom of Illyria on a set which doesn't change, but there is so much action, who cares or needs change? It was brilliance by the director, Robert Richmond, and his "creative team" who conceived the landing.

The photographer's perfect timing of the shots and the airy leaps in unison made for mouth drops. The characters run around the stage hither and yon, just like those actors from the silent films of the era, but this is live. It's played upon a stage now, and carried off with aplomb.

And so much music. If ever there was a Shakespeare with more, which is it? Thank goodness we get to hear Joshua Morgan (Valentine) play Debussy's Claire de lune  more than once on the piano. If music be the food of life, play on.

The Twelfthth Night cast could have danced all night to the tunes played by Feste (Louis Butelli) on the ukulele and Valentine (Joshua Morgan) on the electric piano/Scott Suchman
 

Oh my gosh: Richard Sheridan Willis as Malvolio. A show stealer par excellence. He was simply fantastic. His eyes almost rolled out of his head. Those moments when he tried to smile could have cracked Congressional communication and cooperation. Send him to the Hill! (Wait, he's there.)

What did he lay upon inside the piano? It hurt to look at him cooped up inside the metal cage for so long. It looked so uncomfortable. Poor lad. I began to really feel sorry for him. Does anyone remember the great actor Peter Lorre? A resemblance, no?
 

Okay: the story (briefly): Twins are shipwrecked, and each believes the other has drowned. Viola makes it to shore where she lands (ahem) a job with Orsino who is in love with Olivia who soon falls in love with Viola who becomes a man, Cesario (to obtain his job), who falls in love with Orsino. Of course.

Malvolio is smitten by Olivia, and Viola's twin brother, Sebastian, turns up at the perfect moment, and Olivia invites him to marriage (thinking he is Cesario), and this all makes sense, doesn't it? An improbable madness rather like life which all goes round and round, up and down, like the swirling waters in the fantastic first scene when the siblings almost drown.

Rachel Pickup seemed so natural in her role of Olivia, she must have been playing herself. (?)

In Twelfth Night Olivia (Rachel Pickup) falls in love with Cesario/Viola (Emily Trask)/Scott Suchman

 

And I haven't mentioned the supporting cast, dominated by James Konicek (Sir Andrew Aguecheek) who flutters about and steals the thunder.

There's a lot of action up and down the center aisle, too, and another show-stopper who served as musical narrator of sorts was Louis Butelli, master ukuleleist who plays Feste who became entranced by an audience member in the second row, a woman who may have been part of the exquisite cast, too, but that was unlikely since she seemed genuinely flattered. Whatever you will. All's well that ends well.

Another feather in the play cap is the costuming (Mariah Hale). For lovers of Victorian dress, they will adore the gowns. Olivia's are marvelous, darling, especially the bridal gowns at the end which are only on stage such a short time. (Which reminds me: At the DAR Museum (Constitution Hall) over on D at 17th is a terrific exhibition of women's fashions of the 1920s. It's free!)

But back to the subject at hand: The choreography (Eleni Grove) and fight scenes (Casey Kaleba) made me wince several times, fearing the swords were real, and the sounds of the clashes soon gave me to know they were. Or flashed like they were.

And the title: Twelfth Night derives from the twelfth night of the Christmas season, the Epiphany on January 6, the end of the season's merrymaking, somewhat like Mardi Gras when foolishness, gaiety, and fun cease (for a while). So have at it what you will, but hurry for the time draws nigh when these frolics do end.

By the way: I wonder if the designer/artist for the program cover based his or her concept on Ophelia by John Everett Millais, likely the most popular piece in the Pre-Raphaelites exhibition which just ended at the National Gallery of Art. They are very much alike.

(Sshhhhhh….for non-Shakespearean scholars (a minority in this town, but keep mum), we all know that Bill's content can be difficult at times to keep up with, what will all the characters, multiple plots, sub-plots, love triangles, quartets. It does help and adds much to the production's enjoyment to read SparkNotes in advance (3X; it's not long). Available right here which permits readers to mentally straighten out the characters, their roles, and who does what, when, and where, and makes for better grasp of the quick action than that usually gained by reading the synopsis in the program notes while you wait for the show to start. (And you'll score 100 on the test, too, at the end, but who's counting?) Try it and see what you think.)

And now for the nominations:

Hear ye! Hear ye!

Helen Hayes Outstanding Director, Resident Play: Robert Richmond

Helen Hayes Outstanding Lead Actor, Resident Play: Richard Sheridan Willis

 

 

Helen Hayes Outstanding Costume Design, Resident Production: Mariah Hale

What: Twelfth Night by William Shakespeare

When: Now through June 9 (dark Mondays) with matinees also on Saturdays and Sundays

Where: Folger Theatre, 201 East Capitol Street, SE, Washington, D.C. 20003

How much: $39 - $60

Metro stations: Union Station or Capitol South

Duration: About 2 hours and 40 minutes with one intermission

For more information: 202-544-4600 or (ticketing) 202-544-7077

patricialesli@gmail.com