Earnest goes to Bollywood at Plosive Theatre.

Plosive Theatre certainly knows how to get your attention. Ottawa’s newest theatre company has taken to the Gladstone’s stage with a curiously layered rendering of Oscar Wilde’s The Importance of Being Earnest set in British colonial India. This may require pausing a moment to review director David Whiteley’s extensive glossary of terms, time better spent enjoying the view of Andrea Robertson’s set, as lit by John Solman, with its collage of dusty colours, hinting that the streets of Calcutta lie somewhere beyond. Pretty as the set is, however, it doesn’t give the actors much room to move about, and the empty space between stage platform and curtain creates a physical and metaphysical gap that not all the performers are adept at negotiating. {Is this a play within a play? Are the bored colonials staging a performance?} The result is that Wilde’s comedy of manners feels a bit cramped, with both Garret Quirk’s Algernon and Stewart Matthews’ Jack forced to elbow it out on a small bench for almost the whole of Act One. They really do seem to be talking to themselves.

Things liven up considerably when the ladies enter top of Act Two. At this point the plot of the play also – finally – kicks in, as Brownyn Steinberg’s Cecily and Teri Loretto-Valentik’s Miss Prism give much meaning and substance to Wilde’s exposition, revealing both plot and character as they rattle on about the merits of this or that individual, and Cecily’s educational curriculum. Cecily, it soon becomes clear, isn’t interested in learning any language other than flirtation, and Steinberg gives this effervescent ingénue of budding womanhood a definite sexual sizzle.  As counterpoint, Loretto-Valentik’s Scottish Prism is full steam in pursuit of Chris Ralph’s Reverend Chasuble. Whether it’s the result of the elusive perfume that hangs in the hot India air, or in defiance of the dictates of pre-destination, Prism and Chasuble seems constantly on the verge of disrobing and taking to the wings.

This repressed sexual energy is welcome as our hero Jack seems to possess not much of it. True, Wilde has written Jack Worthing as a self-centered and contemplative spirit, and  Matthews diligently carries us forward. However his character throws a few too many mannerisms into this play about manners, and the result is moments that arrest the show’s pace as he inserts an unnecessary pause or break in a line we simply need him to get to the end of!

In pursuit of Cecily, Garrett Quirk finds his groove, and Kel Parsons’ Lady Bracknell fires off her zingers with precision. If she doesn’t exactly inspire the right amount of fear and trembling, it is in part, because those who must bargain with her to achieve their heart’s desire, don’t tremble as much as they should. Still, now that Bracknell, in India, must also remain omnipotent in the eyes of the colonials, director Whiteley and Parsons might have intensified her presence. The wives of British colonial authorities were well know for engaging in half-mad, hybrid eccentricities of dress as they took up arms against climate and custom. However she arranges her feminine, or masculine side, Bracknell is not so much a character as a force behind, and justification of, all things Empire.

So, what about putting Oscar Wilde’s comedy of manners in British controlled India? Is Whiteley a little sun-struck? Well, not quite. What emerges from the Indian characters is a poignant stream of politesse simmering under the surface of these mad-dog Englishmen. Maybe Sean Conforti’s Lane, Henna Kaur Sodhi’s Merriman – grace personified – and Sheldon Heard’s Musician, a character who confusingly is and isn’t part of the play proper, keep the whole gang of them around because they’re just too dammed amusing to ship home. Who, Whiteley seems to be asking, has the real manners in this world?

But Whiteley’s real rational for this cultural transplant is abundantly clear by the end: he just wanted to get everyone on stage dancing! True, we don’t have a Bracknell in drag, but make no mistake, this is an earnest pantomime.

The Importance of Being Earnest closes Saturday, February 26.