Multiplied by two
Playing nine parts, a pair of actors plan for a Wilde time
A year ago, in a crowded village hall in Dorset, England, Jon Haynes and David Woods were performing their two-man version of Oscar Wilde's "The Importance of Being Earnest." A little boy's voice suddenly beat Haynes to the punch with the play's most popular line: "A handbag?"
The line, which refers to the place where a baby was found, is intoned by the indomitable Lady Bracknell, and it has become famous in England because of the way Dame Edith Evans said it in the 1952 film.
"It's a line that's reached iconic status in England," says Haynes by phone recently from that same village, this time visiting friends. "It's absurd; in almost every review of other shows, critics comment on the delivery of the line. I just throw it away."
A little boy calling out a line of a 111-year-old play is probably not going to happen in Harvard Square, where Haynes and Woods, who make up the theater troupe Ridiculusmus , began previews of "The Importance of Being Earnest" on Thursday at the American Repertory Theatre. But you never can tell.
Wilde's play, a witty comedy of manners that skewers the pretensions of upper-class British life, is beloved in England and a mainstay in American theaters.
But few will have seen an "Earnest" like this one. Haynes and Woods play all nine parts: four young lovers, the dowager Bracknell, a minister, a governess, and assorted servants. The actors start out fully dressed; their costumes in the first scenes include ruffled gowns, trousers, spectacles, wigs, and monstrous hats, including one topped by a stuffed rooster. But then things start to speed up, and costumes and props start to fly. By the end, the two are stripped to their underwear.
"We have a quite athletic relationship with our dresser in the wings," says Haynes. "There's lots of ripping and swearing when we can't find an arm hole."
They also switch characters by changing their voices. At one point, Haynes says, while his character is lying on the ground in a faint, "I even 'throw' my voice to make it sound like it's coming from somewhere else."
But even the most physically adept and technically proficient actors can't portray half a dozen people, all talking practically on top of one another. So in their frenzy, the pair use clothing and objects as stand-ins for characters.
Wilde was making a point about how none of us are what we seem, says Haynes. "He was obsessed with the idea that everyone was pretending to be something they weren't, of having secrets," he says. "Of course in his life, he had different roles. He was a married man, the editor of a women's magazine, and at other times he was frequenting male brothels in Soho. So he had different faces, and 'The Importance of Being Earnest' is about that."
Their method of playing all the roles, he says, is their connection to the themes of Wilde's play.
"The way we're doing it, you get used to me as Algernon, but a few seconds later I'm Gwendolyn, and a few seconds later I'm Lady Bracknell, but the audience thinks, 'Wait, wasn't the other actor Lady Bracknell a few seconds ago?' "
ART associate artistic director Gideon Lester was instrumental in bringing the troupe to Cambridge. "Their trademark is absolute deadpan, which means it's not camp, or at least intentionally camp," says Lester. "It's not like watching drag; it's a very serious 'Earnest,' except it's not, because the whole thing is ridiculous and stupid to the power of 20."
"Earnest" is the first classic play performed by Ridiculusmus. The two cofounded the troupe with another man in 1992 when they attended London's Poor School, an acting school. Later they added two more actors, but gradually whittled it down to just themselves. (In Latin, Ridiculusmus means "ridiculous mouse.")
Haynes and Woods began by performing their own adaptations of novels, including Jerome K. Jerome's 1889 "Three Men in a Boat" and Flann O'Brien's 1967 "The Third Policeman," before moving into creating original pieces, including "Ideas Men" and "Say Nothing."
Their work is not easy to categorize; journalists have termed it physical, political, avant-garde, Dadaist, realistic, and anarchic theater. When asked if he agrees with those descriptions, Haynes demurs.
"That's for others to say. I would like to say that whatever [play] we're doing, I'd like it to be different from the one before. We're trained in naturalistic acting, like the Method school, so even when we're doing broad comedy or farce we have that very real acting delivery and style."
In 2000, they found themselves wanting to do someone else's script -- and to attract a more mainstream audience. Enter Jude Kelly , one of the most powerful women in British theater, who saw them perform one of their pieces at the Barbican Theatre . Kelly is artistic director of the South Bank Centre , a fine arts and performing arts complex in London, and has founded several theaters, as well as directed more than 40 productions for stage and screen. In 1997 she was awarded the Order of the British Empire.
"I was then creating an installation about fear and courage," she says by phone from London. "They were impressed by my interest in fearlessness, the idea of taking risks when performing. And they were interested in being directed."
Kelly says they decided the play should be a classic. The three went back and forth over what kind of play the pair could do. Stoppard ? Beckett ? Restoration comedy? Finally, they landed on "Earnest."
"We wanted something with mass appeal," says Haynes. And he had loved "Earnest" for years.
"I'd been a Wilde obsessive when at 14, I practically memorized it," he says. "I decided I wouldn't have to do much work." 