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Duse
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Directed by Nick Mancuso.
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Actors.
Lord knows, I love ‘em dearly but they can be self-absorbed at times, stuck in their own little world.
And none more so, apparently, than the illustrius Italian actress Eleonora Duse, who lived from 1858 to 1924.
In Duse, now at Tarragon Extra Space, we meet the great actress at the very end of her life; it has in fact been adapted from Ghigo De Chiara’s play called L’Ultima Notte Di Eleonora a Pittsburg.
And as she prepares to go on stage in Pittsburg for the last time, Duse agonizes about her life and her art.
The former seems to have been particularly unhappy; her first child died as a tiny baby and she had the misfortune to become involved, like a number of others, with the Italian playwright/genius/rake Gabriele D’Annunzio.
As far as her art is concerned, she was a subtle and unhurried performer, the first of the modern, naturalistic actors. But the play suggests she lost faith in the ability of theatre to discover the truth.
All of which makes her final evening on earth a sombre occasion.
“I’m so tired of being tired and of dying drop by drop,” she complains at one point. “I don’t want to search for a glory that no longer gives me any joy.”
And this proves to be one of the play’s drawbacks. There is a sameness of tone throughout, little variation in emotional range or pitch.
And well as Jennifer Dale portrays Duse (and she is very good), one longs for a moment of relief from the gloom, the occasional acknowledgement of the existence of other people outside the world of theatre.
It does happen once, when Duse talks about her work visiting and comforting wounded soldiers during World War I. It stands in stark contrast to the rest of the play and is quite moving.
In general, however, the piece is somewhat inaccesible to anyone not familiar with Duse and her place in theatrical history. It also helps to know a few words of Italian, since Dale/Duse utters quite a few words in that language.
The play, adapted from the original by Dale and director Nick Mancuso, does elicit a certain amount of pity for the plight of this driven woman, dying alone in a hotel room. Mancuso has found a good rhythm and Dale holds our attention to the end.
But, like Duse herself, the play is self-absorbed and precious, and ultimately of limited appeal to a general audience.
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