Enthusiasm will only get you so far and if you need proof, visit Title 66’s current production of Clive Barker’s The History of the Devil. The young cast and crew contain more than a few stars of tomorrow; unfortunately, they’re saddled with Barker’s meandering script, a fairly unseaworthy vessel that the talented crew have to fight to bring to into harbour. The central premise is interesting enough: the Devil (Lucas Chartier-Dessert) has the chance to return to Heaven if we can convince a judge and jury that he is not responsible for humanity’s ills.
Seven actors play a pantheon of characters who are either trying to help or thwart Lucifer’s homecoming, including two enthusiastic prosecutors (Arielle Palik, Liana Montoro), a less-then-enthusiastic defence attorney (Kyle Mcilhone), the poet Dante (James Harrington), a smart-aleck demon (Delphine DiTecco), a dotty court clerk (Lily MacLean) and none other than Jesus Christ (Logan Williams).
It’s a provocative plot that’s rich in philosophy – is Satan a scapegoat? does humanity ultimately bring its problems onto itself? But unfortunately that’s all the play really is: an excuse for some philosophical meanderings. The plot stumbles as it tries to find a central character or relationship for us to care about. Scenes come and go with only the vaguest sense of conflict: rather than attempt a cohesive narrative, we’re given a series of sketches designed to subvert some common belief about our cultural/religious past.
These sketches are framed by the trial itself, where the various testimonies of the witnesses descend into flashbacks that take us from the ancient world to the modern one. Barker has a great deal of fun crafting one shocking situation after another. But it all comes at the expense of the show itself: by the end of the overlong first act (ninety minutes!) we haven’t met a single character whose fate we actually want to know, including Satan himself.
Still, high marks have to be given to the cast and crew: they inject the production with the right amount of vaudevillian atmosphere and each of them prove more then adept at playing the handful of roles given to them. Charier-Dessert’s Satan moves from smarmy to vulnerable and back again, making it impossible to know just when he’s being sincere – which is probably the whole point. And Arielle Palik does some impressive acting calisthenics; in the blink of an eye, she transforms from a stuck-up lawyer into a mentally challenged girl who’s a few apples short of a bushel.
The whole thing is under the direction of Jeremy Michael-Segal, who seems to have a good grip on how to create a spectacle. Despite the numerous scene and costume changes, everything moves along at a fairly strong pace and he plays well with both the actors and the more provocative elements of Barker’s script. He’d be wise to talk to his cast about enunciation, though: everyone spoke so quickly that it was hard to understand them at time, especially when their mouths were covered by masks.
Given that this is a young company presumably financed by acts of beggary, the design by Logan Williams is particularly impressive. The costumes are witty and don’t always look like they were pulled out of someone’s closet. As for the set, it’s minimal while still maintaining a thematic resonance to Barker’s overall themes. Williams recently completely work as an assistant-set designer for Black Theatre Workshop and he’s clearly a rising talent.
Still, a cast is only as good as their material. In the end, Devil provokes the one question Barker probably wishes we wouldn’t ask: would you rather sit through a good show with bad actors or a bad show with good actors? For my money, I’ll go with the former and wait for the folks of Title 66 to find a script more worthy of their burgeoning skills.
History of the Devil by Clive Barker runs at Theatre Rouge, 4750 Henri Julien until March 4. For tickets visit www.title66.com or their facebook page.
