Review of "Lettice and Lovage"

Have you ever been on a guided tour of a historic building while traveling overseas and the narrative by the guide seemed somewhat implausible?  In the divertingly entertaining production of Lettice and Lovage, playing at the Westport Country Playhouse, the flamboyant docent Lettice Douffet (Kandis Chappell) can’t help embellishing her recitations of unexceptional, humdrum bygone structures.  This gets her in trouble with Charlotte Schoen (Mia Dillon), the stringent Human Resources Director for the Preservation Trust, which owns the property being verbally aggrandized.   The two women, seemingly polar opposites, end up having a lot in common and an unlikely friendship blossoms until an almost cat-aclysmic event fractures their newly forged bond.

 

L-R:  Mia Dillon and Kandis Chappell in Peter Shaffer’s “Lettice and Lovage,” directed by Mark Lamos, at Westport Country Playhouse, now playing through June 17.

    (203) 227-4177.  www.westportplayhouse.org      Photo by Carol Rosegg

Playwright Peter Shaffer, who penned such dramatic works as Equus and Amadeus, delivers a trifling comedy that furnishes continuous smiles with a heaping dollop of chuckles.  He takes the opportunity to satirize modern architecture, but the essence of the play is friendship with all its pains and pleasures.

The cast is led by Kandis Chappell as Ms. Douffet.  She is highly theatrical and colorful as the mannered and put upon historical guide.  At first the actress comes across as being too over-the-top and incongruous for the role, but she slowly brings out the decency and honesty in the character, which humanizes her portrayal.  Mia Dillon, fresh off her gender-bending role in Hartford Stage’s Cloud 9, gives her bureaucratic official a layered presence.  She transforms from a more one-dimensional hard-as-nails, by-the-book administrator to a woman with a poignant and variegated backstory.  The always reliable Paxton Whitehead is a befuddled gem as the solicitor Mr. Bardolph, seeking to defend Ms. Douffet from, what turns out to be, a hapless accident.  His flummoxed looks, exasperated disposition, and improvised drumming prowess add a needed comic bounce to the show.  Sarah Manton is a fine, amusing counterpoint, in the brief role of Miss Farmer, to the churlish Ms. Schoen.

 

L-R:  Paxton Whitehead, Mia Dillon, and Kandis Chappell in Peter Shaffer’s “Lettice and Lovage,” directed by Mark Lamos, at Westport Country Playhouse, now playing through June 17.

    (203) 227-4177.  www.westportplayhouse.org      Photo by Carol Rosegg

Scenic Designer John Arnone has constructed a simple, yet effective set for Act I’s bleak and cheerless mansion setting and the latter half of the show’s basement apartment of Ms. Douffet.  The attention to detail—a Shakespearean throne, quaffing mugs, and a bejeweled sword add a Victorian richness to the stage.

Director Mark Lamos keeps the focus on Ms. Chappell’s portrayal.  He enlivens the character with overwrought and melodramatic flourishes that produce consistent laughs.  His collaboration with Paxton Whitehead produces some inspired zaniness.  The pacing of the production can at times be languid and measured, but never sluggish or tedious.

Lettice and Lovage, now at the Westport Country Playhouse through June 17^th.