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Show 'Six Characters' J,' 3J A Taste Of Philosophj t By LARRY FETTZ 1Six Characters In Search Of An Author" "was 'my first A exposure to Luigi Pirandello. Since 1 really know very little about the late Italian playwright and author, 1 was impressed to note that many reputable critics have labeled him one of the out- standing playwrights of our century and have often paralleled Pj him to Shaw, Tbsen and Chekhov. 'jt!t "SIX CHARACTERS," which will be at the Little Theater every night throughout the week, is a good example of the 11 F author at his best. His play deals with a group of frustrated characters who have been denied stage life because their author abandoned them before completion. These characters, who seek fulfillment by entering the rehearsal stage of a director and cast " at work preparing a light comedy, are bent on acting out their lives, and after a good deal of persuasion, they do just lhat, an c through the medium of the assembled actors. ' . ; In "Six Characters" Pirandello is contemplating what s reality and what is illusion. He says that our personalities change fjjj! constantly and we are, both to ourselves and to others, con- tinuously different. To Pirandello, society imposes a heavy mask iiil on man, and man's efforts to get rid of this mask always fill ft because it is only with the mask that he can be accepted by his fellow man. whose love he needs for living. t THE GREAT POINT of the play, however, is the contrast IT between the character's conception of their tragedy aod the rendition that the professional players plan to give it. Here ' Pirandello demonstrates the subtle differences between the I shapeless vitality of a true report on human experience and the neat falsity of the same material trimmed and tidied up by art. n The play is directed in-the-round with .great flui4'iy Robert Hyde Wilson, who has made the most.'par'Ciitrain the last act, of some limited staging possibilities,' rwihf .an f" air of suspense and perplexity in keeping with, the ton of the W play. But the cast headed entirely by students, has given the work a rather heavy, dramatics-for-its-own-sake interpretation that tends to prevent the audience from being properly drawn into the confines and mystifications of the Pirandello piece. Among others, the cast includes: Neil Barclay, John Bizaldi, ' Lynne Johnson, Linda C. Smith, and David Dean. |
