Sat in my front row seat in USyd’s intimate Cellar Theatre for SUDS’ The Lamentable Tragedy of Titus Andronicus, I (ironically enough) felt like Lady Macbeth.
After a half a year of hibernation, SUDS awoke from its slumber last night with Dario Fo’s Accidental Death of an Anarchist – a politically-charged romp through…
Cyrano de Bergerac. So, some French dude in the 17
th century has a big nose, what of it?
To my surprise, I left the theatre feeling genuinely moved. Director Annie Fraser has taken a script, parts of which have not aged well, cut and modified it, and put on a production that, unlike the original, does not exult its protagonist but rather meditates on the consequences of his narcissism (i.e., he can’t see beyond his own nose).
That protagonist is Cyrano, a brilliant poet and swordsman. He’s in love with the intellectual Roxanne, but is reluctant to confess his feelings due to having a nose that “precedes him by fifteen minutes.” Upon hearing that Roxanne is interested in a soldier named Christian, who is, unbeknownst to her, “shit” with words, Cyrano has an idea – he’ll write love letters, Christian will sign, seal and deliver them, and at some point, he’ll tell the truth.