Marie Antoinette: The Color of Flesh, which officially opened at the Performance Network Theatre in Ann Arbor, is an engaging story that is surprisingly funny given the inevitability of its conclusion.
The setting, of course, is France during the turbulent years leading up to the French Revolution, 1774-1793, culminating in anarchy in the streets and the beheading of royals, aristocracy, and anyone seen as an enemy of the people.
Joel Gross is a writer who has displayed great dexterity in creating realistic, relevant historical characters in his films, plays and novels. In The Color of Flesh he gives us three characters who begin the play as fascinating but scarcely likeable people. By the final scene, they have each grown as individuals and the audience has grown to care about them.
This production by Performance Network Theatre,directed by Shannon Ferrante with a beautiful set and costume design my Monika Essenhas, pulls the audience into the story with a compelling, voyeuristic intimacy.
Jill Dion portrays a complex Elisabeth Vigée le Brun (Elisa). A beautiful, social-climbing painter, Elisa creates flattering portraits of the aristocracy to win their patronage and rise above her impoverished, peasant birth. Marie Antoinette is a big catch that Elisa plays with an afficianado's expertise. But by the end of the play, she learns to love and value the friends she once ‘used’ -- evolving as a human to earn the true artist's insight that penetrates surface beauty to reveal inner grace and luminescence.
Drew Parker plays her sexy lover, the Count Alexis de Ligne (Alexis), a philanderer who is as naïve about war and politics as he is sophisticated in the seduction department. A left-leaning bon vivant who champions the peasants without understanding the depth of their hatred or anticipating the insanity of mob rule, Mr. Parker gives us an Alexis who becomes a wiser man in time to be the true hero he once only affected.
Chelsea Sadler gives us an imperious but woefully naïve Marie Antoinette. A pampered beauty who is largely neglected by her husband, Louis XVI, Ms. Sadler helps the audience discover a sympathetic character who learns, with the help of her friends, to face her final role as queen with quiet courage and equanimity.
Weekly performances are Thursday, Friday and Saturday at 8:00 p.m. and Sunday at 2:00 p.m., with 3:00 p.m. matinees on Saturday August 13th and 27th.
Tickets can be ordered at the Performance Network Box Office at 734-663-0681, online, or by coming to the Performance Network Theatre (120 East Huron St., Ann Arbor, 48104) Monday-Saturday 11:00-6:00 or one hour before a performance. Tickets are priced at $22 - $41, with discounts available for seniors, members, students and groups.
Comments