Adultery, Bad Manners, and Bad Tempers

In the basement of the church where The Apple Cart: A Political Extravaganza is being performed, with just 33 seats in the audience, there is a throne onstage with a note marked “RESERVED.” It is clear, from the moment the King of England sits in the chair, that this play, which concerns a power struggle between His Majesty and the prime minister, will make for an evening full of surprises.

The cleverly produced, excellently acted farce by George Bernard Shaw takes place in a room designed by Kristin Foti, cluttered with writing desks, old newspapers, and old furniture inside a royal English palace. There, amid the suggestive chessboard patterns adorning the floor and upholstered chairs, a cabinet of old and new ministers fights for negligible amounts of power. Meanwhile, outside these walls, the world changes in drastic ways which they neglect: “Am I to understand that by some convulsion...” jokes the King (Nicholas Martin Smith), “the continent of North America has sunk into the ocean?”

Director David Scott takes particular care to emphasize noise. One moment, the sedate Baroque dances of the opening music are playing. The next, there is a shouting match between the classically named ministers and assistants—Proteus, Lysistrata, Pliny—each with a different accent. The stage is alternately soft and thunderous. The Postmistress General (Paula Hoza) gets up and dances in the middle of a cabinet meeting while singing in her matronly Irish accent; a Scottish Prime Minister (Damian Buzzerio) shouts almost all of his lines; and the new president of the Board of Trade (Ron Sanborn) frequently bawls out such jests as: “I say, ‘use your vote intelligently by voting for me.’ And they do, and that’s democracy!”

Even the costumes, designed by Viviane Galloway, are loud: one minister wears a judge’s robes, another, a kilt. Several wear colorful suits (others more sedate), and the King looks as though he has just returned from his country club in sweater-vest, breeches, and stockings. Their motley assortment of accents, set against a flurry of color, all set in relief against the black-and-white of the chessboard furniture, makes for a colorful play on all levels.

The play entertains many topics, from the comedy inherent in politics, to the necessity of an English monarchy, to gender tensions. One moment, the King, who is a deft balance between lion and fox, brings a serious tone to the otherwise light mood as he defends his crown: “I stand for the Eternal against the Expedient.” In another moment, the King’s mistress (Annalisa Loeffler) pays him a dubious compliment: “you have almost the makings of a first rate woman in you.”

Several parts are particularly well acted. Smith’s King manages to behave as if he is impressed by the wit of his conversation even as it comes out of his mouth. Not to be cast aside is Hoza’s dancing and singing Postmistress General who brings the level of the farce to new heights—her mocking laugh punctuates every exchange, leading us to believe she knows something we don’t, which of course she does: that the trick of politics is to sing and dance and mock.

But the funniest aspect of the play is the political game. Some of the ministers attempt to coat their madness with a veneer of decorum. But ultimately, the many references to the theater, the bouts of laughter and applause at glibly executed punch lines, the songs, the dances, and the other forms of chaos, place this work in an insightful and entertaining world of its own.