George Bernard Shaw was working as a drama critic when he saw a London production of A Doll’s House and was inspired to write Candida. It was Shaw’s contention that Ibsen’s protagonist Nora should not have fled her condescending, domineering husband, but rather stayed home and made a case for greater agency.
If Candida‘s title character isn’t as iconic as some other Shavian heroines, she is a force to be reckoned with. A goddess both to her husband, himself a charismatic and admired pastor, and a young poet who becomes besotted enough to grovel and fight for her affections, she proves by the end of this comedy—one of Shaw’s “Plays Pleasant”—to be as wise as she is irresistible to men.
Avanthika Srinivasan, who plays Candida in Gingold Theatrical Group’s new production, does not, at first blush, seem a natural fit for the role. With her girlish smile and slightly shrill chirp of a voice, Srinivasan is more adorable than alluring. Under Gingold artistic director David Staller’s shrewd, playful guidance, though, she gradually emerges as an anchor of warmth and reason in a staging that broadens the play’s humor without sacrificing the incisiveness of its satire.
I’ll admit the approach didn’t win me over immediately. The Reverend James Morell, Candida’s spouse, and the poet Eugene Marchbanks aren’t the only foils in the play; Morell, a Christian socialist, clashes at length with his father-in-law, Mr. Burgess, a businessman and staunch capitalist. Shaw’s own political leanings did not, notably, prevent him from instilling a palpable foolishness and vanity in Morell.
In this production, though, R.J. Foster’s Morrell exudes a dashing authority, down to his resonant baritone, where David Ryan Smith’s flamboyantly buffoonish Mr. Burgess appears to have wandered in from a musical comedy. Avery Whitted’s Eugene, similarly, walks the line between naïve tempestuousness and boyish whining a bit unsteadily at first.
But as the play progresses, Staller gradually turns up the temperature so that the performances line up in comedic sync. That includes Amber Reauchean Williams’s portrayal of Morell’s hyper-efficient, adoring secretary, who loosens hilariously after a booze-soaked sojourn towards the end.
Whereas Candida was written in the 1890s and set in Victorian London, Staller has cannily placed his revival in Harlem in 1929, at the end of a decade marked by indulgence and, for women, both progress and unfulfilled ambition. There are references to the Greenwich Village Alternate Monday Literary Radical Poetry Club, and the Kips Bay Branch of the Independent Labor Party, among the places where Morell holds court.
Lindsay Genevieve Fuori’s richly colorful, handsomely cluttered scenic design nods to the decadence of the era while showing the extent to which Morell—an apparently undecadent man, but one who has been left to his own devices for a short period when the play opens, with Candida returning from a trip—depends on his wife, notwithstanding his self-image as protector.
For those unfamiliar with the play, the choice that Candida makes at the end may not seem exceedingly bold by today’s standards. But Shaw’s women can still enlighten as well as entertain us, and Staller and his company have done this one justice in both respects.
Candida opened October 25, 2022, at Theatre Row and runs through November 19. Tickets and information: gingoldgroup.org
