It takes a lot of chutzpah to assay a sequel to The Importance of Being Earnest, one of the most crystalline comedies of all time. Playwright Alice Scovell is distinctly not up to the task, even with the help of a charming demi-hexagonal set (designed by Samantha Reno) and the welcome presence of Christine Pedi as the indomitable Lady Bracknell.
Pedi is grossly underutilized here: Why cast a celebrated chameleon (Pedi’s impersonations are legendary) as an iconic character whose emotional range starts and stops at haughty? In this extrapolation, Lady B does get a bit frisky – improbably – toward the denouement, but it’s simply unbecoming. For the bulk of the play, Pedi sits encased in a casque-like black wig and an inelegant, slapped-together gown (provided by designer Rainy Edwards), understandably glowering.
Seven years have passed since the double wedding, which the press supposedly labeled “elegantly excessive.” (“Excessively elegant!“ Lady Bracknell protests: the author enjoys this riposte so much, she repeats it.) The former ingenues – bubbly country innocent Cecily (Tora Nogami Alexander, strident and over the top) and sophisticated Gwendolyn (Kelly Mengelkoch, appropriate in behavior and affect if a bit off chronologically) – have devolved into bored housewives ripe for serial plucking by a handsome prospective live-in tutor (Moboluwaji Ademide Akintilo).
The young(ish) wives set up an interview with this self-acknowledged “third-rate tutor” to instruct their apparently less than gifted sons. That the respective apples haven’t fallen far from their trees becomes obvious once we meet Algernon (James Evans, antic) and Ernest (Jeremy Dubin, studiously droll), presented here as competitively clueless buffoons. Whatever happened to Wilde’s disparate but appealing young swains?
A three-ring, oh-so-polite sex romp ensues. Were Wilde, a Francophile, on hand to see his masterpiece reduced to a tiresome French farce, he would no doubt be freshly mortified.
The Rewards of Being Frank opened March 5, 2023, at A.R.T./New York and runs through March 26. Tickets and information: nyclassical.org
