MR. FOOTE’S OTHER LEG HAS ITS KICKS
British comedy will rattle your funny bone, writes Jerry Wasserman.
When the Playhouse Theatre Company folded in 2012, it left a void in Vancouver’s theatrical landscape. Who would do the British classics? They’re expensive — big casts, lots of costumes — and who wants to see that old stuff anyway?
We still get plenty of Shakespeare, but not much else of the Brits, except from United Players. They opened last season with Farquhar’s 18th-century comedy The Beaux’ Stratagem. This year, it’s Ian Kelly’s contemporary backstage comedy set in 18thcentury London, Mr. Foote’s Other Leg.
Like Tom Stoppard and Peter Shaffer, Kelly takes liberties with the past, mixing humour and philosophy, art and history in a rich theatrical brew. Sarah Rodgers’ handsome, funny, Playhouseworthy production features a strong cast with an outstanding performance by Kazz Leskard in the title role.
But I say of this play what the Emperor in Shaffer’s Amadeus said of Mozart’s music: Too many notes!
Actor-manager Samuel Foote specialized in comedy, mimicry and cross-dressing. He ran London’s Haymarket Theatre in the 1750s and ’60s and lost a leg in a riding accident. Infamous in his own time, Foote now warrants barely a footnote. Yes, be
prepared for many lame jokes. In the words of Irish actress Peg Woffington (Elizabeth Willow): “You’ve heard about the comedian with one leg called Foote? What’s his other leg called?”
Foote, Cockney stage manager Mrs. Garner (Bethany Stanley), Woffington and leading actor David Garrick (Francis Winter) conspire to avoid the Lord Chamberlain’s censorship by establishing a theatre to do the plays of out-of-fashion Shakespeare.
Garrick has even rewritten Romeo and Juliet with a happy ending.
But Garrick takes himself and Shakespeare very seriously. Foote takes nothing seriously. He mocks Garrick as “the world’s foremost exponent of the pause” and they become rivals. Bawdy Peg takes Garrick as a lover and joins Foote in a kind of 18thcentury vaudeville.
The Prince who will become George III (Joel Garner) proposes a contest: Garrick’s company will perform Othello as a tragedy and Foote’s will do it as comedy. The comic Othello is suggested by Foote’s dresser, Frank Barber (Russell Zishiri), a Jamaican ex-slave who came to London as a freeman.
George himself is pretty funny: “What’s the opposite of comedy? Germany.” Sadly though, we never see those duelling Moors.
We do see, and hear described in excruciating detail, the amputation of Foote’s leg by Scottish surgeon John Hunter (Simon Webb). “It’s going to be bloody difficult to top that in the second act,” says Foote. And he’s right.
Top-heavy act two is a hodgepodge. Hunter and Benjamin Franklin (Kenta Nezu) experiment with electricity and mindfulness. Frank discusses freedom and white privilege. Accusations of libel and buggery, diseases physiological and psychological, 18th-century name-checking (Dr. Johnson, Tristram Shandy) and many Handel jokes abound.
The American Revolution even makes a cameo appearance. Too many notes!
The production values are very fine: Brian Ball’s gorgeous painted set, Catherine Carr’s lush period costumes, Darren Hales’ subtle lighting effects and exquisite violin and cello music from Aidan Wright and Shona Struthers.
If the life theatrical appeals to you, see Mr. Foote’s Other Leg. You’ll get a kick out of it.