Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? Review

Allison Luthy-Kaplan

Arts Journalism

2/17/08

Who’s Afraid of a Facial Expression?

The Whole Art Theatre’s latest production, “Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?,” fails miserably in its attempt to bring emotional range to the stage, with a four-person cast containing three deplorable actors.

The play’s writing is by far its best element. Edward Albee wrote his play in the same style as a Virginia Woolf novel, if the characters were older and raging alcoholics. The dialogue is delivered in the matter-of-fact, realistic way that characterizes Woolf’s writing, “You’re going to regret this.”

“Probably, I regret everything.”

The two main characters in “Virginia Woolf” are an unhappily married couple, with an embittered history professor as the husband, George, and a sadistic wife, Martha, who mocks him for his lack of ambition. “I hope that was an empty bottle, George. You wouldn’t want to waste good liquor on your salary.”

Most of the play’s humor and plot bases itself in the premise of putting two dysfunctional couples in a room together and seeing who survives the night. The only thing missing from this vicious, incisive setting of verbal attacks is a referee to tell when one of the characters will not be able to stand up again.

The only decent actor in the cast, Richard Philpot, embodies George with a bland cynicism that could start its own British sitcom. The character of George is reminiscent of any undervalued husband who wanders about the house like an abused dog, unable to stand up for himself. Mr. Philpot is hilarious and poignant in the role, muttering such sarcastic phrases as “blood under the bridge” to himself, passive aggressively asserting his authority in the house against his wife.

Martie Philpot tries to play Martha with such excessive drama that she only succeeds in shouting at George with a face void of any expression. Mrs. Philpot often seems more pitiable than her character, for she seems to have been let down by the director, who should have informed her that yelling all her lines does not make her a better actor.

Randy Wolfe, the director, made the additional critical mistake of allowing the play to be performed in a theatre-in-the-round, a convention, which only Mr. Philpot can negotiate. The stage blocking is done so clumsily that the other three actors spend most of their time with their backs to a quarter of the audience. Mr. Philpot constantly moves about the stage, pouring drinks and putting on music, enabling all of the audience to see his face the majority of the time, but he was alone in doing this.

Richard Philpot should go and start his own one-man show where his extraordinary acting talents cannot be let down by another dismal ensemble such as that in “Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?”. The only thing people should be afraid of is not Virginia Woolf, but three hours in a claustrophobic space with some of the worst acting in Kalamazoo.