The Little Foxes
cast list
Tina Benko, Marton Csokas, Sanjit De Silva, Lynda Gravatt, Elizabeth Marvel, Cristin Milioti, Thomas Jay Ryan, Greig Sargeant, Christopher Evan Welch, Nick Westrate
directed by
Ivo van Hove
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The Giddenses and the Hubbards of Lillian Hellman's 1939 play The Little Foxes live amidst a flurry of greed and disillusionment. They inhabit their Southern plantation at the dawn of the century, decades after the close of the Civil War, their lives tinged with as much uncertainty as they are with promise as they are about to enter into a brand new business deal that could plausibly take the family business - a cotton mill - to new heights.
The lady of the house, Regina Giddens (Elizabeth Marvel), finds herself up against some hard truths. Regina's brother Oscar (who married his wife Birdie in order to acquire the mill), presents Regina with a business opportunity: she and her husband Horace can be in on the action as long Regina she can get him to invest. Oscar (Thomas Jay Ryan) and their brother Ben (Marton Csokas) are already investing equal shares. All Regina has to do is convince Horace (Christopher Evan Welch), who's being hospitalized at the moment for an unknown ailment, to put up his share of the money.
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They want her to reap the same benefits they'll be reaping (or at least they claim to), but Regina is no pushover. If her share is so crucial to the overall investment, she wants a bigger piece of the pie in return. Eventually, her greed gets the better of her; Horace as less forthcoming than she wishes, and Ben's son Leo begins to complicate matters. Even Alexandra, her daughter, chastises her for her greed. "There are people who raped the Earth," Alexandra remembers hearing one of the maids saying, "and those who stood around and watched them do it. Well, Mama, I'm not gonna watch you do it."
It's this tug of war between the capitalistic ventures of these two families and the complicity and greed inherent in those same ventures that makes The Little Foxes such a thrilling play. Bolstered by Ivo van Hove's brilliant, incisive direction, the piece absolutely soars.
Van Hove's vision for the piece is doused in deep eggplant-colored velvet carpeting. All the walls and floors are lushly covered, a central staircase placed center stage, above which hangs a video screen that occasionally broadcasts certain off-stage segments of action. The characters don't use props so much as display them. Occasionally, drinks are consumed, but other essential props are placed on a low platform at center stage, where they are acknowledged but not handled.
This Little Foxes is about a clash of wills, not what the actors are holding. Elizabeth Marvel inhabits Regina (a role previously played by the likes of Tallulah Bankhead, Anne Bancroft, and Elizabeth Taylor) with a rough-and-tumble readiness that suits the part. Possessing a formidable physical presence, Marvel, who spends some of her time on stage barefoot, stops around the Giddens house as if she owns it, and, at least in spirit, she does.
Marvel is matched by a uniformly excellent company. Particular standouts include Tina Benko's appropriately ornithological portrayal of Birdie, impressive young actress Cristin Milioti's formidable take on Alexandra, and Christopher Evan Welch's wise Horace.
One expects, with an experimental take on a classic piece, for liberties to be taken, but what's so refreshing about van Hove's take on this play is his utter respect for the text at hand. There are visual flights of fancy to be certain, but never does one feel cheated of the play at the production's center. The Little Foxes, currently on display at New York Theatre Workshop, is the kind of blood-pumping, vital theatre one only rarely sees in New York. How often is such a thing said of a play over seventy years after its inception?
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New York reviews
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Three Sisters, Classic Stage Company
The Piano Lesson, Yale Repertory Theatre
The Momentum, Laurie Beechman Theatre
The Walk Across America for Mother Earth, La MaMa E.T.C.
John Gabriel Borkman, BAM Harvey Theater
Blood From a Stone, Acorn Theatre
Malfi, Inc., Theatre 54
Pieces, 59E59 Theaters
A Delicate Balance, Yale Repertory Theatre
The Memorandum, Beckett Theatre
The Scottsboro Boys, Lyceum Theatre
Driving Miss Daisy, Golden Theatre
Futura, TBG Theatre
La Bete, The Music Box Theatre
Bloody Bloody Andrew Jackson, Bernard B. Jacobs Theatre
A Life in the Theatre, Schoenfeld Theatre
In Transit, 59E59 Theaters
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