Alternatively: Gorgeous Torture, or, "I love the smell of White Shoulders in the morning."
In David Adjmi’s Elective Affinities, a resplendent Zoe Caldwell as Mrs. Alice Hauptmann welcomes guests into a beautifully appointed parlor as a Chanel-clad spider might a fan club of flies. It's not merely a show but an afternoon tea, gorgeously produced by Soho Rep, piece by piece, and Rising Phoenix Rep. It was absolutely one of the highest lights of my 2011.
‘Staged’ in a brownstone on the Upper East Side, this is sight-specific performance at its most intimate. There was some wonderful, powerful, alternatively-spaced stuff this year - The Tenant and Sleep No More especially. Complete with Earl Grey and candied ginger, Elective Affinities appears on the more naturalistic side of that spectrum, delightfully so.
Alice’s house is gorgeous, of course. Crystal. Lilies. Nineteenth century portraiture and an appropriately somber staff to take your coat and serve your tea. You’re also greeted by an enormous abstract sculpture, black and roiling, that I’d liken to a giant lava foot. It dominates a mahogany-paneled living room, dwarfing a marble fireplace and a grand piano. From the start, the whole thing is at once lovely and sinister. I was all in.
Upstairs we were greeted, one at a time, by Mrs. Hauptmann herself. When it came my turn, she took my hand and leaned in, looking a bit concerned. ‘I don’t know you,’ she purred. After I’d introduced myself, she proclaimed my surname a very good one.
I’m fascinated by the idea of the savage inside, and how deeply a surface need be scratched to release it. Alice Hauptmann is certainly the picture of gentility. But one need only introduce the subject of government-sanctioned torture (or a bit of Animal Planet, which Alice gleefully proclaims ‘almost pornographic!’) to bring out her inner brute.
David Adjmi’s script is so sly. The way in which his Alice rationalizes brutality, the coolness with which she excuses, even embraces cruelty, sneaks up on you. It’s seductive, and by the time you realize you may share more of Mrs. Hauptmann’s world view than you’d care to admit, it’s too late. You’re pinned. When she rhapsodizes about the moment in which a gazelle gives up to a predator, she may as well be talking about the audience seated about her, well within striking range. Before I knew it, the teeth of Adjmi’s script sank in deep and I was done for. (I wanted to tell him so afterward, but he has such a smile that I turned shy, sure that I’d say something stupid.)
Mrs. Hauptman talks of having resigned herself to a certain fate. Her Germanic husband thinks her monstrous, as does her (possibly alcoholic) friend Dierdre, simply for speaking her mind. She might have you believe that she’s a doyenne in a doll’s house but I think she’s more like the big savannah cats she admires on the television. She’s patient that way, practically welcoming prey to a watering hole she’s secretly stalked for decades. Alice lacquers her nails blood red.
I was so lucky to have seen this piece, and to be there for a closing night toast. Ms. Caldwell spoke movingly about the passion and dedication of the team behind Elective Affinities, and it was obvious that everyone involved had tremendous love for the project. Hearing her speak, and talking with people from Rising Phoenix and piece by piece, I was inspired by the generosity with which this show was built. This is no-agenda artistry - no one is out to elevate themselves above anyone else. Instead it’s about creating something meaningful, building and sharing something really special. Ms. Caldwell asserts that it’s not really up to us to designate ourselves artists anyway, that it’s not our call to make. The opulence of the surroundings in which she spoke these words pointed up the willingness of a hardworking team of theatre craftsmen to muck in for the greater good of live performance. For me it was humbling and hope-filled. In a year that brought us ego-driven debacles like The Spidish Play, I say more power to artists like these.
And it is the power of art itself on which Elective Affinities finally hangs. The play begins and ends with Alice talking about that hulking sculpture she’s commissioned for the second floor. Her husband thinks it’s growing, and Alice has to admit that it does have a certain terrible power. It lurks and looms, always there like a desperate measure, just the other side of a beautifully paneled pocket door. It’s like survival. Whether a Manhattan dowager or a doe in the jaws of lioness, some instincts simply will not be denied.
Alice eventually admits the sculpture is horrible, but asserts that it is art, nonetheless. It is, paradoxically, beautifully cruel. As with war and torture and plays like Elective Affinities, you can but define your own life in relation to it, and take your lumps.
One or two?
In David Adjmi’s Elective Affinities, a resplendent Zoe Caldwell as Mrs. Alice Hauptmann welcomes guests into a beautifully appointed parlor as a Chanel-clad spider might a fan club of flies. It's not merely a show but an afternoon tea, gorgeously produced by Soho Rep, piece by piece, and Rising Phoenix Rep. It was absolutely one of the highest lights of my 2011.
‘Staged’ in a brownstone on the Upper East Side, this is sight-specific performance at its most intimate. There was some wonderful, powerful, alternatively-spaced stuff this year - The Tenant and Sleep No More especially. Complete with Earl Grey and candied ginger, Elective Affinities appears on the more naturalistic side of that spectrum, delightfully so.
Alice’s house is gorgeous, of course. Crystal. Lilies. Nineteenth century portraiture and an appropriately somber staff to take your coat and serve your tea. You’re also greeted by an enormous abstract sculpture, black and roiling, that I’d liken to a giant lava foot. It dominates a mahogany-paneled living room, dwarfing a marble fireplace and a grand piano. From the start, the whole thing is at once lovely and sinister. I was all in.
Upstairs we were greeted, one at a time, by Mrs. Hauptmann herself. When it came my turn, she took my hand and leaned in, looking a bit concerned. ‘I don’t know you,’ she purred. After I’d introduced myself, she proclaimed my surname a very good one.
I’m fascinated by the idea of the savage inside, and how deeply a surface need be scratched to release it. Alice Hauptmann is certainly the picture of gentility. But one need only introduce the subject of government-sanctioned torture (or a bit of Animal Planet, which Alice gleefully proclaims ‘almost pornographic!’) to bring out her inner brute.
David Adjmi’s script is so sly. The way in which his Alice rationalizes brutality, the coolness with which she excuses, even embraces cruelty, sneaks up on you. It’s seductive, and by the time you realize you may share more of Mrs. Hauptmann’s world view than you’d care to admit, it’s too late. You’re pinned. When she rhapsodizes about the moment in which a gazelle gives up to a predator, she may as well be talking about the audience seated about her, well within striking range. Before I knew it, the teeth of Adjmi’s script sank in deep and I was done for. (I wanted to tell him so afterward, but he has such a smile that I turned shy, sure that I’d say something stupid.)
Mrs. Hauptman talks of having resigned herself to a certain fate. Her Germanic husband thinks her monstrous, as does her (possibly alcoholic) friend Dierdre, simply for speaking her mind. She might have you believe that she’s a doyenne in a doll’s house but I think she’s more like the big savannah cats she admires on the television. She’s patient that way, practically welcoming prey to a watering hole she’s secretly stalked for decades. Alice lacquers her nails blood red.
I was so lucky to have seen this piece, and to be there for a closing night toast. Ms. Caldwell spoke movingly about the passion and dedication of the team behind Elective Affinities, and it was obvious that everyone involved had tremendous love for the project. Hearing her speak, and talking with people from Rising Phoenix and piece by piece, I was inspired by the generosity with which this show was built. This is no-agenda artistry - no one is out to elevate themselves above anyone else. Instead it’s about creating something meaningful, building and sharing something really special. Ms. Caldwell asserts that it’s not really up to us to designate ourselves artists anyway, that it’s not our call to make. The opulence of the surroundings in which she spoke these words pointed up the willingness of a hardworking team of theatre craftsmen to muck in for the greater good of live performance. For me it was humbling and hope-filled. In a year that brought us ego-driven debacles like The Spidish Play, I say more power to artists like these.
And it is the power of art itself on which Elective Affinities finally hangs. The play begins and ends with Alice talking about that hulking sculpture she’s commissioned for the second floor. Her husband thinks it’s growing, and Alice has to admit that it does have a certain terrible power. It lurks and looms, always there like a desperate measure, just the other side of a beautifully paneled pocket door. It’s like survival. Whether a Manhattan dowager or a doe in the jaws of lioness, some instincts simply will not be denied.
Alice eventually admits the sculpture is horrible, but asserts that it is art, nonetheless. It is, paradoxically, beautifully cruel. As with war and torture and plays like Elective Affinities, you can but define your own life in relation to it, and take your lumps.
One or two?
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