By Bart Greenberg***Poor King John. Neither history nor the arts have been kind to him. Suffering from younger brother syndrome (his eldest sibling was Richard the Lionheart), with a domineering mommy (the formidable Eleanor of Aquitaine), during his brief reign he managed to lose England’s substantial 
interests in France and was forced to secede much of his royal powers via the Magna Carta. To his credit, he also reformed the British legal system in ways still in effect today. For most Americans he is the perpetual bad guy in almost every Robin Hood movie ever madde, or the almost feral afterthought in the brilliant film, The Lion in Winter. And to add insult to injury, William Shakespeare’s The Life and Death of King John is one of the Bard’s least produced of the histories. Smoking Mirror Theatre’s production at the A.R.T./New York Theatres, despite their best efforts, made clear the work’s disregard of the king.
Director John Gordon’s production dealt well with the sprawling nature of the 
piece (26 characters, some only briefly seen, plus various settings in two countries) with actors doubling and tripling. For the most part, there was clarity of who they were in any particular scene, thanks to costume pieces (by Janet Holmes and Janice Crosby) and effective shifts in body language by some of the performers. The multiple casting also resulted in a good deal of cross-gender portrayals, some highly effective—Fareeda Pasha as the King of France— and some a total failure —Tessa Grace as Prince Arthur—an unquestionably talented actor but not at all convincing as an adolescent boy who much of the plot hinges on).
The performances were equally varied. Ruby Rich, as Constance, the widow of Prince Geoffrey, was a force to be reckoned with, expertly calibrating her anger and despair so it built throughout the 
play to a shattering conclusion. Bellamy Woodside Ridinger in the title role didn’t evidence that same kind of control; his was a quirky, edgy and jittery performance of self-indulgence that climaxed with a death scene that recalled Joan Crawford at her most extreme. Martin Challinor split the difference: a finely calculated portrayal of a flawed but essentially moral man as John’s loyal-to-a-limit knight and a Disney villainess caricature as Cardinal Panduph. Robert Gordon as the Dauphin of France suggested a fine dramatic arc from innocent romantic to battle-hardened opportunist.
Gordon made some suspect decisions as well. While most of the drama was presented in a straightforward manner, the two major battles in the first half were 
staged as stylistic ninja encounters. Why? Who knows, especially since the same act climaxed with a period sword fight. Another distracting and inconsistent aspect of the production was one of accents. The English characters sounded American, as did the Duke of Austria, but the French personalities had a variety of accents, from subtle to indecipherable.
Certainly, Gordon deserves credit for presenting a problematic play uncut and, ninjas aside, fairly straightforward. That the second half bogs down is far more to do with the script than the production, as two members of the court continuously switch sides, and the story goes off in several directions at once. And sadly the women at the center of the story all die off stage (Constance, Eleanor) or simply drift away (Blanche). Gordon and Smoking Mirrors deserve credit for tackling the play; hopefully their next venture will be more rewarding.
Photos by Jonathan Slaff
