‘Thérèse Raquin’: French thriller delivers

‘THÈRÈSE RAQUIN’: Keira Knightley & Judith Light. Photo: Joan Marcus

THÉRÈSE RAQUIN
Adapted by Helen Edmundson
From the novel by Émile Zola
Directed by Evan Cabnet
Through January 3, 2016
Studio 54
254 West 54th Street
(212-719-1300),www.RoundaboutTheatre.org

By David NouNou

There is certainly something to be said about a Gothic guilt and retribution play. It can be viewed as melodramatic and reeking of moth balls or as a silent movie, but instead of “subtitles,” the actors are actually speaking. I know this sounds oxymoronic because how can a silent movie be a talkie? However, this play is about mood and style; to give you an illustration, picture Lillian Gish in Way Down East, with lots of close-ups and tortured facial expressions by everyone. Had this been 1868, when this play is set, Thérèse Raquin would have been scandalous and shocking, but in 2015, it has to be viewed as a period piece, the style of which contemporary playwrights don’t write anymore.

After all, this is an adaptation of an 1867 Émile Zola novel. You know the pace is going to start very slowly, and as adapted by Helen Edmundson, the dialogue at times is very stilted and cliché. Putting all this aside, amazingly it sustains one’s interest and you go along with it.

Thérèse (Keira Knightly) has been left in the care of her aunt, Madame Raquin (Judith Light), since she was age two, by her seafaring father. She has grown into a young woman and obligingly marries her first cousin, the sickly and loathsome Camille (Gabriel Ebert), man who happens to be the jewel of his mother’s eye. Needless to say, this is not a happy marriage. In fact, Thérèse is absolutely despondent. Camille forces the family to move to Paris from a small village by the Seine for better job opportunities.

In Paris, they live modestly over a notions store which Madame Raquin runs with the aid of the ever-miserable Thérèse. Camille is doing well in his new job at the railway company and one day meets and brings an old friend, Laurent (Matt Ryan) from his old village to reacquaint him with the family. As tiresome as Camille is, Laurent is magnificently handsome and calculating. Naturally this awakens the almost dead Thérèse and they proceed to have the most illicit of love affairs. They are so tangled up in their passions that there is only one way out: Kill Camille.

So far you just saw the setup; the second act is where the action comes in the guise of guilt, voices from the dead, remorse and retribution. Basically you have all the elements of an early melodrama. What makes the play unique is the style in which it is presented. Evan Cabnet, the director, has modulated the pace of the piece with the style of the era. It is a style which American theatergoers are not usually accustomed to. The American style unfolds rather quickly, but the European style, as in Ibsen and Molière plays, has to first set the mood in able to unfold.

Thérèse Raquin is a curious vehicle for Keira Knightly to be making her Broadway debut in. She is one of the great beauties of the screen and to have chosen such a dour character is a bit perplexing. She hardly has anything to do in the first act but show us her tortured soul, and in the second, being riddled with guilt, her character goes into fits of hysteria. You might say poor Thérèse; she never caught a break.

Judith Light is a delight to watch. She plays the doting/grieving mother well, even if her character is mired in clichés. Matt Ryan is handsome and conniving as required, and what woman in her right mind wouldn’t relent to his advances? Let’s put it this way: If this was a silent movie, he wouldn’t be the dastardly villain to whom you would be hissing. That dubious honor would have to go Gabriel Ebert, the toxic odious husband. I was surprised the audience didn’t applaud at his demise, because at my performance the audience en masse was gasping at every turn of event, which reminded me of the silent movie experience.

After all, if a play that can elicit such reactions from an audience, doesn’t that make it unique? Since this is not exactly a revival, it is a new experience; it is unfamiliar to us who haven’t read the novel, so we go along for the melodramatic ride. To add to the mopey milieu, there are some fine sets by Beowulf Boritt—which descend from the ceiling to stage in fluid precision at times. Also worth noting are sound designer Josh Schmidt’s original compositions, many of which sound like arty, ominous intros to French diva Mylène Farmer’s wonderfully outré Europop songs. For Francophiles and those who love the brooding, tragic romance of Continental potboilers, Thérèse Raquin certainly delivers.

Edited by Scott Harrah
Published November 4, 2015
Reviewed at press performance on November 3, 2015

‘THÈRÈSE RAQUIN’: Matt Ryan & Keira Knightley. Photo: Joan Marcus

‘THÈRÈSE RAQUIN’: Keira Knightley. Photo: Joan Marcus