The School for Scandal
Of course, London was a theater town: some 12,000 of its 750,000 inhabitants attended each week. Meanwhile, back in puritanical America, theater was not only morally suspect but prohibited by a resolution of the First Continental Congress. Although the British staged several of Sheridan’s plays for their own amusement during the revolutionary period (a curious choice given the playwright’s procolonialist stance), it wasn’t until 1786 that a professional American troupe presented The School for Scandal in New York. And to the moral outrage of some of the nation’s new leaders, General George Washington attended–more than once.
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What could have attracted a man as studiously political as Washington to Sheridan’s folly? To modern eyes–including those of director Brian Bedford in his current staging of the play for Chicago Shakespeare Theater–The School for Scandal appears a trifling gem in which members of London’s idle upper crust scheme and deceive their way to social prominence, gleefully assassinating the character of anyone within spitting distance. But to audiences in Sheridan’s day the play was radical and dangerous, carrying a coded seditious message in the characters of brothers Joseph and Charles Surface. Joseph appears a strict moralist, convincing half the town he’s above reproach even as he connives his way into the bed of a married woman. Charles, on the other hand, is denounced for his life of open debauchery but in private moments is unfailingly generous and good-hearted. In these portraits Sheridan’s audience would have clearly perceived Benjamin Hopkins and John Wilkes, two politicians competing for the office of city chamberlain. Hopkins, loyal to the crown, was an esteemed banker and merchant held in high regard, like Joseph, despite rumors that he lent money at an outrageous interest rate to a minor. Wilkes, the radical pro-American whom Sheridan supported, was an openly promiscuous philanderer and pornographer akin to Charles. By exposing the paragon of virtue as a hypocritical self-promoter and elevating the self-indulgent sot to a “loveable rake,” Sheridan was stirring a volatile political pot. In fact, the night before The School for Scandal opened, the state censor threatened to shut the show down because of its references to Hopkins.
One striking feature of this production is its volume. For the most part, the actors spend the evening bellowing, as though they were in a much larger theater. You hear all the vocal effort, the great gasps for air, the exploding final ps, which send fine mists of saliva onto the stage. But you don’t hear much in the way of nuance–and there’s no surer way to flatten comedy, especially comedy as sprightly and verbal as Sheridan’s. As Teazle, a man saddled with a social-climbing wife who insults him at every turn, Bedford maintains a state of such uniform perturbation he can do little but caterwaul for two and a half hours. Most of the rest of the cast follow suit, turning nearly every line into a blaring declaration. On occasion this assaultive approach works to great effect, especially when a supposedly genteel character drops all pretense of nicety and unleashes some angry invective in an aside to the audience. But more often Sheridan’s wit is bulldozed, and long stretches of the play, especially during the first three acts, seem overworked dead space.
