Review Posted on Thu, Apr. 25, 2002

By NATHALIE PLOTKIN
nplotkin@redshift.com

The Staff Players Repertory Company concludes its 32nd season with the West Coast premier of "Jocasta," Sandra Perlman's highly praised new play.

This is yet another retelling of the nightmarish Greek myth about Oedipus in which the Delphic Oracle has stated that the son of Laius and Jocasta will murder his father and marry his own mother.

The story has long held an almost mesmerizing fascination for authors ranging from Homer and Sophocles and on through the Medieval and Renaissance periods to the present day.

Playwright Perlman, in revisiting the ancient myth, realized there is only a name "Jocasta" mentioned for the woman to whom this tragedy befell in the script which is powerfully emotional. Yet often exquisitely humorous brings her absorbingly to life.

The season theme of "Reality Among Shadows" is once again brought compellingly to the fore by director Marcia Hovick, who elicited luminous performances from the three-woman cast.

Carey Crockett's stage design was tastefully and artistically evocative of the play's location.

The first act introduces the women who, in the course of the play, engage one's emotions, sometimes with whimsical humor, but also, as the characters reveal themselves, with deepening interest and sympathy.

MaryAnn Schaupp-Rousseau as Jocasta the widowed queen of Thebes, is required to marry the hero Oedipus, who has become the savior of the kingdom of Thebes.

She is a fragile, unhappy person to whom fate has dealt terrible blows. Schaupp-Rousseau inhabits the role with delicacy, engaging our sympathy easily and directly as she bemoans her helplessness in the face of the edicts of the Gods.

Ismene, Jocasta's mother, is a stronger human being who looks at life with a practical appreciation of its human possibilities, but also with an awareness of its mythologically ordained impossibilities.

Constance Denning as Ismene is an assured, vibrantly accomplished actress who rivets one's attention at every turn. She gets the best lines, which she delivers with great understanding and zesty wit.

The unexpected and powerful climax in the first act, that is heart-rending in its depth of feeling and emotion, is electrifyingly created by Schaupp-Rousseau and Benning.

The second act reveals that Jocasta has learned the bitter fact that the Oracle's prediction has been fulfilled. She has unknowingly married and had children by her own first-born son. He had unknowingly killed his father. Jocasta feels her life has become unbearable.

Jocasta's maid and confidant of many years, Iris, as played by Virginia Daggett, is a sympathetic and tender character who tries desperately to ease her Queen's fate.

This playing out of the Oracle's words, however, makes for a very somber and moving conclusion.

"Jocasta" is a very well written play that engages the heart and the mind. There are times when laughter and sadness are in close juxtaposition.

The production is exemplary and the acting is exactly what is needed to bring out the best of this strong script. It is one of the finest plays I have seen this season.GO!