Chicago Shakespeare Theater

A lot of people are looking at Gary Griffin's production of “A Flea in Her Ear" at Chicago Shakespeare Theater as a homecoming of sorts, which seems to take the veteran Chicago director by surprise.  After all, Griffin has been pretty busy working on a little project called “The Color Purple" on Broadway and trekking out to London to win an Olivier Award for restaging Stephen Sondheim's “Pacific Overtures" at the Donmar Warehouse.  Once “Flea" opens on March 20, he will begin casting the national tour of “Purple," which will open what is expected to be an extended sit-down run in Chicago.  He has also committed to a London staging of “Kismet," and without being too presumptuous one wonders if a Tony nomination can be in his future.  So what brings this acclaimed theatre artist back to our fair city?  “In terms of theatre, Chicago is home and it always will be.  I still think it's the greatest theatre city in the world.  It's where I always want to start new things."

The Georges Feydeau classic farce “A Flea in Her Ear" may not exactly strike theatergoers as a “new thing," but Gary Griffin has a way of looking at old things with fresh eyes.  And for this Chicago Shakespeare production, he enlisted playwright David Ives to come up with a brand new translation that not only honors the original, but which will hopefully bring the humor across to a modern audience.  Ives began by writing a literal translation from the original French as a blueprint, which gave him and Griffin ideas of where they wanted to go.

Griffin and Ives first worked together in New York on an Encores staged concert production of a 1930's Gershwin flop called “Pardon My English."  Ives was brought in to spruce up an old book that Griffin politely suggests “posed challenges."  “I was just knocked out by it, the way he keyed the humor to what the show originally intended.  I had wanted to do a new adaptation of ‘Flea' so David read it and got excited about it.  What we've tried to do is start over, rather than trying to be different.  The set design is slightly different from previous productions and we wrote with that in mind.  Some of the movement takes different speed so it's really been written for this specific production.  I can't imagine conceiving this for any other theatre (than Chicago Shakespeare)".

Griffin takes a surprising approach to dealing with farce that is based on logic, form and craft.  “Farce is an incredibly visceral kind of comedy and when you get it right you feel it in your head."  Griffin notes that the situation comedies we know and love are rooted in the principals of farce.  “I Love Lucy was very similar in its form, although it's shorter like a one-act Feydeau play.  In farce, everything has to make sense on a certain level and that gets turned up 50 percent faster than normal.  Every door you go into has a reason; everyone knows the reason why they are going in and why they are coming out.  At the core of every good farce is absolute logic."

That kind of philosophy may not surprise those who have followed Griffin's amazingly incisive productions of everything from Stephen Sondheim and Lerner and Loewe to Shakespeare.  The content may vary in a Griffin show, but you are always aware of an expert craftsman at the top of his game.  He credits his success to working in theatres with “excellent support systems, so I can really focus on what I need to focus on.”  He also speaks highly of the actors he surrounds himself with, which typically include some of Chicago's brightest talent.  His goal is “how we're going to present the actor.  Although I've never really been an actor, how the actor works is usually how I imagine a production.  Even though I work with great designers, all of the elements and choices we make have to do with presenting the actors.”

As someone who can pick and choose his projects, Gary says he is “thrilled we're getting to do (“Flea”) in Chicago.  It's a very special project, getting to work with actors I've worked with for years and some I've wanted to work with.  And having David here has been amazing.”  He calls “A Flea in Her Ear” “an extremely complicated play in a lot of ways.  David counts 47 subplots, which you may not be fully aware of as long as you're taking the ride.  This is a more sophisticated form of comedy than most of us think of when we see the typical 2 act British farce.”  Gary finds similarities between good farce and musical theatre that have to do with craft and sound structure.  “In a musical, the book and score have to come together in a very structural spine.  Where most dramas are driven by emotion, the energy and timing drives farce.  I think farces are very musical.  All behavior has a rhythmic pulse you have to get right.”

Gary Griffin was born in St. Louis and grew up in Rockford, Illinois, when he began to commute into Chicago as a child to see plays.  He relocated to the city after college and began working in some of the area's best theatres, The Marriott, Drury Lane Oakbrook, Apple Tree, Court and Chicago Shakespeare, among them.  It is evident that the Chicago theatre community is still near and dear to his heart.  “In Chicago the notion that we are all here to serve the play really does live.  I haven't always found that to be true, but in Chicago it is true.  I think that is why we have such astoundingly talented people here, they have committed themselves to honing their craft.”  Gary believes that the ensemble ethic drives Chicago theatre and takes pleasure in being able to “start from moment one attacking the challenges of the piece” rather than courting actors to do a particular play.  “Chicago theatre embraces risk and gives us the opportunity to do a lot of challenging work.”

Every play is a new challenge to Gary, who takes pride in moving comfortably from different styles of theatre.  His style “varies from project to project.  I do whatever the project demands.”  He names Frank Galati, Michael Maggio and Kyle Donnelly as three directors he admired as an aspiring director, “not so much because I wanted to direct the way they did, but I admired their careers and versatility.  They all had their own personalities as directors.”  The National Theatre's Nicholas Hytner is another inspiration to Griffin, and that influence certainly showed in his Marriott Theatre production of “Carousel,” which paid homage to Hytner's own British revival while incorporating Griffin's own ideas as well.

Griffin always has plenty of irons in the fire, but he manages to find the relaxation and down time he needs and still find time for everything he loves to do.  “First of all, I like to work.  I love being in a rehearsal room more than anything in the world, and it's never a burden.”  Griffin hopes to tackle more original work, and observes that creating a new musical (“The Color Purple”) was a fantastic experience he is anxious to do again.  One thing is certain.  Whether it is a musical, farce or serious drama, if the name Gary Griffin appears in the playbill it will no doubt be a class act.  To potential audience members, he advises “you may not love everything we do, but we're going to do it with all the resources and as much passion as it deserves.”

 
Joe Stead
Theatre In Chicago News Contributor Joe Stead has spent over 20 years as a critic, director, designer and performer. His reviews currently appear online at www.steadstylechicago.com.