"Triumph of Love" thoughts
Mar. 10th, 2025 08:29 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
newmanWe went to see a dress rehearsal of Triumph of Love at the Huntington. I liked most everything about it except the play itself...not even, because I thought the translation (it was originally in French) was lovely. I think there is a core element of the plot -- and one particular scene which is meant to be romantic -- that made me really uncomfortable.
Includes spoilers for a play written 300 years ago
Triumph of Love was written in 1732 by Pierre de Marivaux. It's a 3-act comedy that is a descendent of commedia (that's not speculation; there's a Harlequin character in the play) and was appropriately first performed by the Théâtre Italien in Paris. Before the dress rehearsal started, the play's director, Loretta Grieco (who is also the Artistic Director of the Huntington) came and told us a little about her experience with the play when she was fresh out of grad school and how much affection she had for it. She also mentioned that when she was appointed Artistic Director,
The premise of the somewhat absurd plot involves the beautiful princess Leonide whose uncle (now dead) usurped the throne from the rightful king. After her uncle died, the crown passed to her father and eventually her, but she is determined to abdicate in favor of Agis, the rightful heir who has been raised in anonymity to protect him. Agis' guardian is a scholar/philosopher (Hermocrates) who espouses a rather dim view of love. He, his sister (Hesione), and their two servants (Harlequin and Dimas, the gardener) live in solitude on a country estate, rarely interacting with the outside world. Leonide and her maid arrive disguised as young men. Hermocrates wants them to leave, but Leonide needs a few days to hang about and make Agis fall in love with her. In order to do this she maintains her disguise as the young gentleman Phocion to seduce the sister, reveals herself to be a young woman (but not the one she actually is) to Hemocrates, and (eventually) a different woman to Agis. She bribes Hermocrates' two servants to help her out. With their assistance and that of her maid, she fools everyone and gets everyone to fall iin love with her up until the end when all three of them realize that they are in love with the same person. She convinces Agis that she did this all for the love of him and the desire to restore him to his throne and they go off together.
The production is very good. I have no idea what the original Freench is like, but the translation was clever and lyrical. The single set is evocative, has some nice magic tricks, and is lit beautifully. The lighting deserves mention on its own; it transforms the single set (a garden) throughout the day, which adds visual interest and creates this hyper-realness which supports the emotionalverqaciy of the actors -- who are all great. Seriously. No exceptions.
In the commedia we often stress "BE the joke, don't TELL the joke" and these people had that down. They were earnest, they were real people doing ridiculous things because they were in love. And, with each of the three, Leontyne really has to work to break down their defenses. And that is my biggest problem with the show. Hermocrates and Hesione are the vecchi and we're used to seeing the vecchi get their comeuppance. The problem here is that while Pantalone is unctuous and greedy and the Dottore is bombastic, pompous, and obtuse, in Triumph of Loveneither the Scholar nor the Spinster are villains. Yeah, they are the obstacles to Leontyne seducing Agis. Yes, they both teach a philosophy that says people are better off without love. Yes, they have been telling Agis since he was born that the Princess Leontyne wants him dead to secure her place on the throne... but all of that is pretty reasonable behavior, and it's pretty much the fact that Leontyne enters first and does her exposition (explains her side of things) that makes the audience side with her.
By seducing Hermocrates and Thesione, Leontyne doesn't just trick them, she hurts them badly and with no obvious remedy. If this were an i Sebastiani scenario, the vecchi wouldn't be siblings and at the end of the play – their passions now awakened – they would go off together as an 'appropriate' pairing. But with no likely objects for their affections, their forced to retreat back into the world they had created before Leontyne arrived... a world that she has just destroyed.
At the end of the play, I felt real pity for the 'villains' and pretty much thought the 'hero' was a narcissistic psychopath.
Worse, when Agis says he doesn't know why he should trust her and that she has been toying with the affection of everyone here, she pretty much uses the same defense Richard III does with Lady Anne when he woos her over the corpse of her husband (whom he has killed). "This is your fault. If I wasn't so in love with you, none of this would have happened!" The actual language used is so full of red flags that it's almost hard to read the text...:
Creepy right? That's the language of a villain, certainly by modern standards. My mid 18th-century theatre is weak compared with my knowledge of the eras before and after, but I either I'm missing something or Marivaux's underlying point was to side with the philsopher and prove that love just leads humans to do some really screwed up things.
Includes spoilers for a play written 300 years ago
Triumph of Love was written in 1732 by Pierre de Marivaux. It's a 3-act comedy that is a descendent of commedia (that's not speculation; there's a Harlequin character in the play) and was appropriately first performed by the Théâtre Italien in Paris. Before the dress rehearsal started, the play's director, Loretta Grieco (who is also the Artistic Director of the Huntington) came and told us a little about her experience with the play when she was fresh out of grad school and how much affection she had for it. She also mentioned that when she was appointed Artistic Director,
The premise of the somewhat absurd plot involves the beautiful princess Leonide whose uncle (now dead) usurped the throne from the rightful king. After her uncle died, the crown passed to her father and eventually her, but she is determined to abdicate in favor of Agis, the rightful heir who has been raised in anonymity to protect him. Agis' guardian is a scholar/philosopher (Hermocrates) who espouses a rather dim view of love. He, his sister (Hesione), and their two servants (Harlequin and Dimas, the gardener) live in solitude on a country estate, rarely interacting with the outside world. Leonide and her maid arrive disguised as young men. Hermocrates wants them to leave, but Leonide needs a few days to hang about and make Agis fall in love with her. In order to do this she maintains her disguise as the young gentleman Phocion to seduce the sister, reveals herself to be a young woman (but not the one she actually is) to Hemocrates, and (eventually) a different woman to Agis. She bribes Hermocrates' two servants to help her out. With their assistance and that of her maid, she fools everyone and gets everyone to fall iin love with her up until the end when all three of them realize that they are in love with the same person. She convinces Agis that she did this all for the love of him and the desire to restore him to his throne and they go off together.
The production is very good. I have no idea what the original Freench is like, but the translation was clever and lyrical. The single set is evocative, has some nice magic tricks, and is lit beautifully. The lighting deserves mention on its own; it transforms the single set (a garden) throughout the day, which adds visual interest and creates this hyper-realness which supports the emotionalverqaciy of the actors -- who are all great. Seriously. No exceptions.
In the commedia we often stress "BE the joke, don't TELL the joke" and these people had that down. They were earnest, they were real people doing ridiculous things because they were in love. And, with each of the three, Leontyne really has to work to break down their defenses. And that is my biggest problem with the show. Hermocrates and Hesione are the vecchi and we're used to seeing the vecchi get their comeuppance. The problem here is that while Pantalone is unctuous and greedy and the Dottore is bombastic, pompous, and obtuse, in Triumph of Loveneither the Scholar nor the Spinster are villains. Yeah, they are the obstacles to Leontyne seducing Agis. Yes, they both teach a philosophy that says people are better off without love. Yes, they have been telling Agis since he was born that the Princess Leontyne wants him dead to secure her place on the throne... but all of that is pretty reasonable behavior, and it's pretty much the fact that Leontyne enters first and does her exposition (explains her side of things) that makes the audience side with her.
By seducing Hermocrates and Thesione, Leontyne doesn't just trick them, she hurts them badly and with no obvious remedy. If this were an i Sebastiani scenario, the vecchi wouldn't be siblings and at the end of the play – their passions now awakened – they would go off together as an 'appropriate' pairing. But with no likely objects for their affections, their forced to retreat back into the world they had created before Leontyne arrived... a world that she has just destroyed.
At the end of the play, I felt real pity for the 'villains' and pretty much thought the 'hero' was a narcissistic psychopath.
Worse, when Agis says he doesn't know why he should trust her and that she has been toying with the affection of everyone here, she pretty much uses the same defense Richard III does with Lady Anne when he woos her over the corpse of her husband (whom he has killed). "This is your fault. If I wasn't so in love with you, none of this would have happened!" The actual language used is so full of red flags that it's almost hard to read the text...:
AGIS: Don't touch me! Let me go!
LEONIDE: I will not let you go, I will never let you go. If you refuse to listen to me you are the most ungrateful of men
AGIS: Me? Whom you deceived? Ungrateful?
LEONIDE: But I did it for you, it was for you that I deceived everyone. I had to. Every fals word I have spoken is proof of my love. My heart's desire is honest. My love is true. You're wrong to insult me. And all the love you have for me – you can't see that now, but you do love me. And you will respect me. You will even ask my forgiveness. I know I will get through to you! [...] I did everything and anything I could to mislead them, to delude them, to seduce them. Because making them love me was the only way I could get to you, and you were the only object of everything I have done here. I was inspired at every turn by your eyes, your hands...your mouth...
Creepy right? That's the language of a villain, certainly by modern standards. My mid 18th-century theatre is weak compared with my knowledge of the eras before and after, but I either I'm missing something or Marivaux's underlying point was to side with the philsopher and prove that love just leads humans to do some really screwed up things.
