Marquis' chaotic troupe of madmen mock Marat

JOHN YI/YH All the color and pageantry a French nutcase can offer.

Jean Paul Marat and the Marquis de Sade are two of the French Revolution's most intriguing characters. A sick, angry man, Marat espoused social revolution at all costs, while Sade fixated upon pain and sexual brutality. Marat/Sade, a play by Peter Weiss, pits the two men against each other in an intellectual battle acted out by the inmates of a French insane asylum. Director Ryan Karels', BR '00, interpretation of the play, though it has its imperfections, is an engaging performance.

The play's action takes place in 1808 at the asylum of Charenton, where Sade is a resident. The Marquis has written a play about Marat's persecution and murder for the inmates to act out. As a publicity stunt, the asylum's director (George Cederquist, SM '01) invites the public to watch the opening performance. Marat/Sade is this performance, and captures the attendant turmoil of the asylum. As the play-within-the-play continues, the carefully maintained order of Charenton slowly disintegrates, reflecting Marat's own unraveling in the days leading up to his murder.

The two leads, Ben Vershbow, BR '01, (Sade) and Jeremy Strong, TC '01, (Marat) are nothing short of stunning. Vershbow manages to portray Sade without taking the easy way out and making him into an erudite monster. His character inspires sympathy, yet not to the point that the viewer forgets Sade's cruel imbalances. Strong achieves a similar feat with Marat. Though his character requires fewer nuances than that of the Marquis, he makes the bitter polemicist believable and multidimensional.

Unfortunately, the ability of the supporting cast does not quite match that of the principals. The most important supporting element of Sade's play, a chorus of four inmates, alternates between on-target performances and overplaying. The patients who comprise the cast of Sade's play are similarly uneven. During most of its two hours, the performance totters between orchestrated absurdity and utter chaos. Marat/Sade is a play of ideas, but they risk being lost in its cacophony.

Despite these occasional glitches, the first act is well executed. The lighting and sets are effective, and the story flows smoothly. Karels expertly highlights the play's central conflict between Sade's nihilism and Marat's bloody and nearsighted idealism. Sade's narrator (Blake Edwards, SM '02) provides slow-witted recitatives that mediate disputes between the asylum's inhabitants and help advance the plot when it threatens to get bogged down amid absurd interjections. Despite being almost 90 minutes long, the play's first half is tightly constructed, holds the viewer's attention, and advances the action.

But the second and final act is spotty. Its setting and blocking are formulaic and the lighting appears to change randomly. But Sade's play builds to a beautiful climax as, bathed in a pool of stark red light, Corday (Julia Kots, TC '01) murders Marat in his bathtub. Still, this scene gives way to yet one more stretch of yowling, orgiastic chaos.

Despite its flaws, Marat/Sade is definitely worth seeing. The philosophical battle between the two men plays well and, to its credit, the script doesn't pretend to resolve the debate, though it does lean toward Sade's nihilism. More importantly, most of the cast give fine performances, and Vershbow and Strong are outstanding. Marat/Sade is an adventurous piece, and it leaves the viewer plenty to think about.

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