“It’s like you sit there, don’t you? Watchin’ the ballet or the opera on the telly, and… and you call it rubbish, ‘cos that’s what it looks like. ‘Cos you don’t understand. So you switch it off and say, that’s fuckin’ rubbish!” – Rita
Rita is to learn the difference between tragedy and the tragic; how tragedy is the unalterable path, that even if you had tried to stop MacBeth from his bloody mission, he would have done it anyway. Because the tragedy is that he had no choice. It had to happen that way. Rita, a lower-class hairdresser, wants to avert her own tragedy, one involving a sub-literate husband, babies, and loud empty nights at the pub. She wants a choice, and wants tutor Frank to help her find it. But Frank, a well-spoken highly educated failure, is playing out a tragedy of his own. Together, each might find the strength to step off their pre-destined paths.
Educating Rita is a play that laces humor around a heavy core. Rita is so pure in her trashy innocence that it’s possible to ride out the whole play just enjoying the cheeky interchanges between her and her tired professor. Underneath their interchanges there is a whole other layer of dialogue: about failure, about shame, and about that very serious bane of the modern man, stuckness.
I am a longtime fan of Michael Swanson, who plays the beleaguered Frank. His trademark mildness emphasizes his ability to interject intensity and passion at key moments in a performance. He only gets a few opportunities to show those abilities in this script. His Frank is a man muted by alcoholism and failed aspirations, which might explain Swanson’s choice to portray Frank as quiet and weary, and lacking in charm that would seem to fit the character.
Swanson might, however, simply be a generous performing partner and a sturdy straight man. Because Olivia Saccomanno, as Rita, needed space to shine her considerable talent. Saccomanno’s Pentacle debut marks the arrival of one of the most buoyant actresses to grace its stage in years. Her Rita is incredibly lovable, authentic, and sweet without being saccharine. She moves from comedy to thoughtful exposition seamlessly, and even her English accent seems flawless. (Plus, drop-dead gorgeous to boot? How is that fair?) It would be wise to catch her performance at Pentacle before she realizes what she’s capable of and heads to Los Angeles or New York.
Set in the early 1980s, special nods to costume design and sound design are deserved in this play. The only real indicator of the era of the play, besides being entirely set in an office with no computer, was Rita’s many changing outfits. Each outfit was practically a character in itself, vividly charting Rita’s growth across the span of the production. Similarly, the ’80s rock songs used to fill in the blackouts between the many scenes had a powerful effect on the audience, keeping the mood of the play alive through the breaks. There is something terribly happy about hearing 50 people singing “Karma Chameleon” just under their breaths in the blackness.
Educating Rita is a warm, uncliched examination of what it means to create a new beginning, propelled by the near-perfect performance of the actors. Don’t miss it.
SEE IT FOR YOURSELF
Educating Rita
Runs through May 14
For show times and ticket information, visit pentacletheatre.org
