- Deborah Strang, Jeanne Syquia, and Trisha Miller (photo by Craig Schwartz)
Reviewed by F. Kathleen Foley
A Noise Within
Thru April 20
RECOMMENDED
Nothing can quite top my memory of first reading Jane Eyre at the age of 10—completely unaware of the dire secret hidden in the attic of Thornfield Hall. The excitement and suspense grew with every unfolding chapter. When the mystery was finally revealed, the shock was electric.
Of course, the initial surprise of that long ago revelation can never be replicated, but reading Jane Eyre on an almost yearly basis over the decades has become a cherished ritual, as is watching the many film iterations of Charlotte Bronte’s ground-breaking 1847 classic. (As Jane and Rochester, Mia Wasikowska and Michael Fassbender give a master class in repressed emotionalism, but Ruth Wilson and Toby Stephens score as the sexiest Jane and Rochester to date.)
Jane Eyre has also been frequently adapted to the stage, including one play that premiered a scant year after the novel’s initial publication. There was even a musical with the same name that played on Broadway in 2000.
Elizabeth Williamson’s stage adaptation, which has been frequently produced since its debut in 2020, can now be seen in director Geoff Elliott’s broodingly gothic production at A Noise Within in Pasadena.
Elliott delivers a well-placed and cohesive staging, splendidly supported by A Noise Within’s resident artists, including scenic designer Frederica Nascimento, costume designer Angela Balogh Calin, lighting designer Ken Booth, and sound designer Robert Oriol, who also composed the melancholy, mood-setting original music. In Nascimento’s protean design, large set pieces gracefully descend to artfully delineate specific locales, Booth’s lighting keeps the proceedings effectively gloomy while never obscuring the action, while Calin’s costumes range from the sumptuous to the simple. Most impressive among the period attire is Jane’s drab grey dress, which she wears throughout the play, and which must serve in a number of on-stage quick changes—no hooks, zippers or distinctively crackling Velcro required. A long ribbon, pulled up the back, instantly fastens Jane’s gown — a small but clever innovation.
A Noise Within’s resident Midas, Frederick Stuart, converts to gold every role he undertakes, and his Mr. Rochester is no exception. Under his hardened outer carapace, Rochester must be a model of effusive romanticism. Stuart uncovers the passion under the paradigm, while also discovering hidden depths of unsuspected humor. Laugh lines in Jane Eyre? Not exactly expected, but Stuart nails them.
Jeanne Syquia’s portrayal of Jane, while certainly competent, is more problematic. Her Jane initially comes across more as a brisk schoolmarm than a retiring governess of modest means and manner. Jane should ideally be “quaint, quiet and grave,” whereas Syquia seems more forthright and self-assured, qualities that impede her character’s progression from deceptive mildness to stormy emotionalism. Later in the play, however, when Jane furiously confronts Rochester, declaring “I am a free human being, with an independent will,” Syquia more than comes into her own, revealing the fiery will beneath Jane’s outward placidity.
Among the able cast, many of whom play multiple roles, Deborah Strang, another of the theater’s resident artists, shows great range as both Mrs. Fairfax, the warm-hearted housekeeper at Thornfield Hall, and Mrs. Reed, Jane’s icy and vengeful aunt, who cast Jane off years previously but now summons her for a deathbed confession. Also excellent is Riley Shanahan as, alternately, Mason, an unwelcome visitor from Rochester’s mysterious past, and St. John Rivers, the religiously zealous minister who is bound for the mission fields and wants Jane as his wife.
Adapting such a complicated story to the stage requires necessary elisions, but Williamson’s adaptation skews certain scenes out of all recognition. When, in their first meeting, Jane looms out of the gloaming, causing an accident with Rochester’s horse, it isn’t clear that Jane has caused the accident. What should be a dramatically charged encounter seems cursory and confusing. And when Rochester subsequently needles Jane about making his horse slip and fall, it almost seems as if he is gaslighting her (as he frequently and problematically does throughout the story), and that she played no role in the mishap. And later, when a fire is deliberately set in Rochester’s room, Jane frantically fights the flames while Rochester lies passively in bed rather than leaping up and helping. When he should be bravely mastering the danger, he is simply, oddly inert. But why blunt those scenes? And to what purpose? Those and other textual blunders could have been at least partially directorially redressed by Elliott.
For the most part, however, the missteps are few and the virtues great. Whether you’re a Bronte-phile, revisiting your old literary love, or whether you’re a newcomer to the joy that is Jane Eyre, this production could satisfy your familiar fascination, or serve as your pleasurable introduction to a beloved classic.
A Noise Within, 3352 E. Foothill Blvd., Pasadena. Thur.-Sat., 7:30 p.m.; Sat. and Sun., 2 p.m., thru April 20. (626) 356-3100. www.anoisewithin.org 2 hours, 15 minutes with intermission.
