Maestro, Aug 8, 1996

by Geoffrey Williams

Courthouse until August 17, 1996

Reviewed by Kate Herbert around Aug 8, 1996

There is a clause in small print at the bottom of every artist's contract with the devil which declares, "Create great art and be a tortured soul." Piotr Tchaikovsky was no exception.

Geoffrey Williams play, Maestro, focuses on the great composer's covert homosexuality, his love for pretty boy, Walsa Lekovsky (Richard Gyoerffy), and the torment this secrecy and deception wrought on his long-suffering wife, Nina (Kath Gordon). This sham of a marriage, designed to keep up appearances in polite Russian and French society, drove Nina to the asylum.

Williams uses the ravaged older and madder Nina as a constant presence and narrator after the fact. Although she talks of her marriage, we never actually see her with Tchaikovsky (Nicholas Stribakos). She wanders, dislocated, through the landscape of his past before she knew him and before she knew his secret.

The production fills the stage with numerous locations, characters and time frames. Its most effective moments were its simplest. Nina, alone at last in a single spotlight, speaks of her love of the piano. Later, Nadia and Alexei, Tchaikovsky's consumptive ex-lover, speak of their mutual love of the great composer. Less is more.

Its most effective moments are its simplest. Nina, alone at last in a single spotlight, speaks of her love of the piano. Later, Nadia and Alexei, Tchaikovsky's consumptive ex-lover, speak of their mutual love of the great composer. The rest of the time the production clutters the stage with numerous overlapping locations, characters and time frames. Less is more.

Nina is perhaps, the most complete character. Tchaikovsky himself is rather thinly drawn. It was surprising that he was not coloured more by his music which plays a significant role only in the second half as he writes Swan Lake for his patron, Nadia von Meck (Sue Dwyer).

Performance levels are uneven but Gordon plays Nina with a simple intensity which is very affecting, avoiding the "mad acting" of others which often upstaged her or made her words inaudible. Dwyer's Nadia is dignified and contained and manages the melodrama of later scenes with style.

This is a major shortcoming of this production. It lapses into overstatement and the melodramatic so that, at times, it is a period soap opera with too much shouting, coughing blood, whimpering under tables, tearing of hair and wringing of hands. The stage, particularly in the first half, is cluttered and the script could benefit from some rigorous editing of dialogue and some of its purple prose.

KATE HERBERT