Tamburlaine the Great, Part I

Considering the great obstacles that face this show at every turn--the small stage, the huge cast, those titanic speeches--Tamburlaine turned out remarkably well. In fact, it is the first play I have seen here that truly deserved the Loeb; instead of receiving a proper theatre, a cast of forty-five had to suffer through eighteen scene changes without a backstage and had to dive through windows on their way to dressing rooms across the court yard.

Aside from purely physical difficulties, the Leverett Dramatic Society had of Tamburlaine himself. Edward Alleyne is dead, and neither Edward Maguire nor anybody else today is equipped to rant that cosmic role. Even by 1600 it had become passe to split the ears of the groundlings, and we who are the heirs of the methods can provide Marlowe neither with actors nor audience ready to accept him on his own terms. Still, Maguire's martial bearing and lush voice mask his inadequacies well enough to let the play move ahead without much tedium. Maguire never plumbs any of Tamburlaine's sensitivity in the great soliloquy of Act Four, nor, most disappointing of all, can he overcome enough of his own refinement to be the "scourge of God."

In somewhat less titanic roles, Madeline Rosten (Zabina) and Booker Bradshaw (Bajadeth) caught the Marlovian pitch and battered away at their lines with enough controlled volume and barbarity to enliven every moment they were on stage. They were the only members of the company with enough vocal power to really make use of what Marlowe gave them, and I will not soon forget the sovereign articulacy this pair displayed in the infamous "braining scene."

Lisa Commager was a beautiful and not unconvincing Zenocrate. She brought off her two major dramatic transitions with competence, if not eclat, and served as a restrained and lyrical foil to the military clangor of the others. Edmund Hennessy, on the other hand, did away with every sort of restraint in his nervous, grimacing portrayal of Mycetes, the effete King of Perisa. Hennessy was terribly funny, but his evident talent as a mime deserves more direction that it got. Now and then a gesture would jibe with a line. However, for the most part, he wasted a lot of inspired movements that distracted attention from the Marlowe and riveted it on his own plastic face.

There were far too many supporting actors and extras for me to discuss them fairly. Only Kenneth Tigar added significantly to the production, as Meander and Basso. The rest were extras in the full sense, which is to say generally ineffective and a hindrance. Director Charles Flowers could not seem to move all those characters out of the audience's sight line, so that there always seemed to be a soldier or two squatting between me and the speaker. In addition, the audience and beyond. The caused a notable lack of dramatic intensity in many places.

Despite its obvious drawbacks. Tamburlaine merits far fuller audiences that last night's. The play's success, and it is no mean success, ought to silence a few of the self-appointed Jeremiahs around here for quite some time.