More bawdy than bard
Review: 'Restoration Comedy' is Amy Freed lite, but even in this minor work her playwriting skills impress.

By Paul Hodgins
March 9, 2007

In the rough-and-tumble playground of American playwrights, Amy Freed has staked out her own utterly original turf. She's a meticulous historical scholar, but she allows the spirit of Mel Brooks and the Marx Brothers to seep into her creative process. That's when the fun begins.

"Restoration Comedy," which opened Thursday at the Old Globe Theatre, is classic Freed. As in "The Beard of Avon" and "Safe in Hell," Freed artfully deconstructs and re-imagines a time and place of great ferment – in this case, England during the Restoration, when King Charles II loosened the Puritans' societal strictures and allowed women on the stage for the first time.

In many ways, this is ripe material for a talent like Freed's. With their breathless sexual roundelays and the giddy atmosphere of high farce, many plays of the Restoration reveled in the spectacle of excessive human behavior and tried only half-heartedly to justify the shenanigans with a touch of moral finger-wagging at the end.

But Freed's source material – she has borrowed from the plots of two works, Colley Cibbers' "Love's Last Shift" and John Vanbrugh's response to it, "The Relapse," conflating them into a single story – is not as rich thematically as Shakespeare. For that reason, "Restoration Comedy" has less to say than Freed's best work, "The Beard of Avon," which speculated on Shakespeare's career and influences and examined the motivations underlying creativity.

Still, this is a Freed play, after all: high and low humor mingle with abandon, and she has a knack for making you feel like a co-conspirator in her nudge-nudge, irony-filled theatrical world.

That feeling starts with a gag I won't reveal that immediately smashes the fourth wall to smithereens. It's reinforced in the prologue, when Loveless (Michael Barricelli) lets us know he's merely an actor playing a part.

The plot, in its outlines, mirrors Freed's historical models. Loveless is an incurable Lothario and wastrel who has burned through his inheritance and abandoned his wife, Amanda (Caralyn Kozlowski), who is still inexplicably in love with him. He has returned from his wanderings only to try to wrest her fortune away. His former partying partner, Worthy (Peter Frechette), now reformed, harbors a secret love for Amanda. He persuades Amanda to win back her lustful husband by embodying Loveless' wildest sexual fantasies, morphing continually from one seductive persona to another. The plan works, much to Worthy's dismay – he was hoping Amanda's disgust or Loveless' adulterous ways would doom the rematch.

The second act hews to the plot of "The Relapse," following the couple's relationship from idyllic country bliss back to disarray when Amanda's cousin, the randy Berinthia (Christa Scott-Reed), comes to live with them. The ensuing hormonal blast threatens at times to blow all 17 of the production's actors off the stage.

Director John Rando paints with a broad, energetic brush (how else can you approach sexual farce?) but you wish at times for a respite. "The Beard of Avon" occasionally backed away from the tomfoolery to make a quiet, serious point or two about human foibles and follies. That's less likely with this material – but I think Freed and Rando could find a few such moments.

Still, many love Freed's plays for their inimitable mix of intellectual and pie-in-the-face comedy, and on that level "Restoration Comedy" works just fine. The highlight of the evening is definitely Danny Scheie, who plays Lord Foppington, a preening and social-climbing dandy, as close to full-throttle Nellie as possible. The result is unfailingly hilarious.

As Loveless, Barricelli is just as amusing. He owns the voice, physical presence, good looks and undertone of dark kinkiness to satisfy the role's demands, anchor the story and hold our half-horrified, half-envious interest. Freed has empowered Amanda by allowing her to discover the controlling potential of sexual role-playing, and Kozlowski has fun counterbalancing her character's primness and hidden tigress.

Ralph Funicello's scenic design, with its false proscenium and cherubic ornaments, makes us feel as if we're in a Restoration theater, and Robert Blackman's costumes celebrate the period's mood of glorious self-absorption. It's an ideal setting for Freed – just don't expect to leave the theater with any deep thoughts mingling with your memories of heaving cleavage, generous codpieces and floor-length wigs.