Actors radiate chemistry in Constellation’s delightful ‘School for Lies’
‘The School for Lies’Through May 28Constellation Theatre Company in residence at Source1835 14th St., N.W.$20 – 55Constellationtheatre.org A lot can happen in a Parisian drawing room.
With David Ives’ “The School for Lies” (now at Constellation Theatre Company), 100 minutes of nonstop amusement unfold solely in the busy salon of popular young society widow Célimène archly assayed by Natalie Cutcher.
Ives’s play is a “translaptation” (transaction + adaptation) of Molière’s 1666 “The Misanthrope,” a classic comedy of manners in verse.
And while at the top of the show, the playwright credits Molière with having mixed “the batter for tonight’s soufflé,” he’s crammed his play with his own elegantly constructed, often funny, and sometimes raunchy verse, reinvigorating a revered work with lots of new laughs and contemporary references.
