the Bangor
Daily News
Victorian thriller stirs up suspense
By Alicia Anstead
Creative team makes ‘Angel Street’ shine
–
“Penobscot Theatre’s new
production of Angel Street overflows with suspense”
For a Victorian thriller, Patrick
Hamilton’s “Angel Street” offers little mystery to audiences. The plot
and villain are revealed almost immediately. The murder takes place 15
years earlier. The missing rubies in the story turn up handily. There’s
just no whodunit in this ornate parlor.
So how is it that Penobscot Theatre’s
new production of “Angel Street” overflows with suspense?
Director Gregg W. Brevoort has the
answer. In a production running through Sunday at the Opera House in
Bangor, he features a smart cast of actors and a powerful creative team
to create a delicious evening of elegantly spooky chills. The key is not
to turn “Angel Street” into gross melodrama but to keep it contained and
psychological, formal and fluid, raising the stakes - and weapons and
eyebrows - subtly and with mounting terror.
Plus Chez Cherry’s elaborate set is
richly draped and wallpapered in shades of ruby red complemented by
dark-wood antiques, old portraits, crystal and paintings. Combined with
the alternating sepia tones and white lights by lighting designer Lynne
Chase, the production is visually engrossing and bespeaks careful
technical attention. One brilliantly placed mirror reflects the actors
as if they are ghosts in a sea of black. The only jarring element is a
heavy-handed front door latch that slams percussively offstage.
Set in foggy Victorian London, the story
follows the dirty work of Mr. Manningham, a clandestine criminal who
torments his wife in the hopes of driving her mad and uncovering a stash
of jewels hidden in the house. Michael Mendelson does this with tall,
meticulous malevolence and every time he is in the room, the air turns
tense. He is a sadistic bully, using tenderness as the first step toward
a cruelty that emotionally cripples his wife and manipulates his
servants, played protectively by Alison Cox and kittenishly by Elizabeth
Van Meter.
What exactly attracted Bella Manningham
to this fiend in the first place never is clear, and here is where the
script of “Angel Street” smacks of film noir hokum. Bella is a devoted,
if daft, wife living in a house where, unbeknownst to her, a fierce
murder has taken place and where, unquestioned by her, the gaslights in
the main room dim nightly. She figures that someone is in the attic and
she suspects it is her husband, but, until the night of the play, she
never has trusted her instincts. She is, after all, haunted by her
mother’s path to madness.
Fortunately, Anne Penner portrays her as
naive, agitated and bedeviled, rather than pathetic, which is a vital
interpretive gift to the audience. This script requires that certain
questions be shelved for two hours — even though the question of Bella’s
helplessness seems to us today to be easily addressed: Fight back!
But for anyone who has been under the
spell of an abuser or the hand of a tyrannical oppressor, Penner
presents both a brokenness of spirit and a faint glimmer of hope in a
sensitive and resonant reading of the role. The dignity of character
comes only in part from Penner’s impressive vocal command. She embodies
the role with depth and sympathy and, though she cannot make Bella any
smarter, Penner does make her real.
John Thomas Waite, as Rough, the
Scottish sleuth who arrives on the scene as part wizard, part guardian
angel, sparkles with wit and bluster. He has his mental dukes up in
defense of Bella, and he puts up a boisterous fight. Like Mendelson,
Waite wracks the nerves but it is because his character is on a giddy
mission of mischief and justice —- and he pushes every scene right to
its exciting edge.
If you can get past the belabored
passages in the script and the predictability of the period piece, this
is a fine rendition of an old chestnut that set the standard for a
generation of stage thrillers.
An interesting historical side note to
“Angel Street”: The play opened in New York on Dec. 5, 1941. Given that
it was an import from London and that World War II was raging, the
backers were so sure the piece would fail, they printed only three days’
worth of tickets. Two days later, Pearl Harbor was bombed. But “Angel
Street” went on to become one of the longest running non-musicals on
Broadway. In 1944, another war-torn year, it was made into the popular
movie “Gaslight” starring Charles Boyer and Ingrid Bergman. The lesson,
again in wartime, is that we should never underestimate the importance
and value of cathartic escape the arts offer. Penobscot Theatre’s “Angel
Street” stands up to that task.
Penobscot Theatre will present “Angel
Street” 7 p.m. April 10, 8 p.m. April 11-12, and 2 p.m. April 13 at the
Opera House. For tickets or information, call 942-3333.
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