Word: algernon
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Perhaps the scientists who used the name Doogie for their strain of supermouse might have more appropriately chosen the name Algernon, as a warning to themselves. Algernon is the mouse in Daniel Keyes' famous story Flowers for Algernon, and the improvement in its skills is short lived, as is the improvement in the skills of the human experimented on in the tale. FRED CRAWFORD Ellon, Scotland...
Burne-Jones' girls have often been ridiculed for their insipid and standardized look, but they have a way of breaking out into an obsessional character--as La Belle Dame Sans Merci. One of his best friends was Algernon Charles Swinburne, the English poet who was a votary of sadomasochism; and time and again, Burne-Jones' haughty damsels with their downturned mouths and leonine manes suggest the imperious sex goddesses of Swinburne's imagination, such as Dolores, with her "cruel/ Red mouth like a venomous flower...
...Incessantly silly plot revolves around friends Jack Worthing and Algernon Moncrieff. Jack is in love with Algernon's cousin Gwendolen; Algernon falls in love with Jack's ward Cecily. Throw in a case of mixed identity, a missing handbag, a formidable aunt and a bunch of cucumber sandwiches and that's basically the plot of possibly the most prefect comedy ever written...
...cast performs solidly, if not splendidly. Terrence Caza and Kathleen McNenny are suitably prim as Jack and Gwendolen and provide a nice contrast to the far wackier pair of Algernon and Cecily. As Algernon, Bill Mondy is a little too affected--even for the obvious dilettante the young Victorian is supposed to be. While Algernon is supposed to know he's being insufferable, the actor playing him should not let his own self-knowledge of how funny his lines are show through. Mondy's performance is a bit smug, particularly in the first...
David Murin's costumes and Rogers Meeker's lighting ably round out the rest of this production's design. Murin sticks mostly to standard Victorian fare but produces some remarkable effects with it, most notably Algernon's dressing gown and the sublime hats worn by Gwendolen and Lady Bracknell in the first act. Meerker's lighting is particularly notable in the second act, when the garden appears infused with sunshine...