2016/04/01 by Ava Caridad · 1 citation
Arts and Humanities · #Shakespeare, Adaptation, and Literary Criticism #Battle #Narrative #Intellect #Art #Literature #Philosophy #Art history #History #Theology
paper · doi:10.5325/edgallpoerev.17.1.0066
openalex publication_date 2016/04/01 · openalex created_date 2022/05/12 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/22
In his second book of theatrical adaptations based on Poe works, Lance Tait has modified some better-known and some lesser-known stories into one-act plays for a smaller cast, taking care there are enough parts for women. With this varied mix, Tait reminds us Poe is a man of letters and not necessarily the “master of the Macabre” that pop culture would have us believe. Even though the stories he selects are full of murder, mesmerism, and hauntings, they also reflect Poe's humor, caustic wit, and eruditeness.The Purloined Letter is based on the third of Poe's three detective stories featuring C. Auguste Dupin, the other two being “The Murders in the Rue Morgue” and “The Mystery of Marie Rogêt.” “The Purloined Letter” is the only one of the three to take place in a confined space and lends itself well to a one-act play.Poe considered “The Purloined letter” his most logical work, and in the battle of wits between Dupin and the blackmailing minister, the reader/viewer can see that while they are equally matched in intellect, Dupin has a higher moral code, and therefore the minister naturally loses the battle due to personal weakness.Of all the plays in this book, this gets the most traditional treatment. The collection then moves from established narrative to stories that have been more reworked for the contemporary theatergoer.Two additional characters are introduced in The Cask of Amontillado, helping out Fortunato and Montresor. Franco is a tenant of Montresor's who is behind in his rent. Through their interactions during the first part of the play, we get an early glimpse of Montresor's sociopathic and rather frightening nature, long before he walls up the unfortunate Fortunato in the catacombs, as he extracts the rent from the uneasy Franco. Franco is present during the first meeting of Montresor and Fortunato. This makes for an edgy departure from the original, as part of the horror of Fortunato's being walled up alive is that absolutely no one knows what has become of him, save Montresor. Had this play been a whodunit, Franco would be a key witness as to who last saw Fortunato. As it is, he is merely a plot device in a narrative where the mystery is not “who done it?” but rather “why?”The second additional character is the Strange Woman, who informs us and the pair several times that “some call me Palhon”—which is a river in the south of France, although Poe's story never makes its European location clear. Montresor is French name, while Luchesi and Fortunato are Italian names; Amontillado is a Spanish wine. Tait firmly places the action in Nice or thereabouts. Anyone who has been to Nice will know how much it can sometimes feel like Italy, so this deviation from the long-held assumption that “The Cask of Amontillado” takes place in Italy only adds to the dimensions rather than detracts.The Strange Woman claims to have drowned in the River Palhon and warns Fortunato, “No one saw you leave. No one will see you enter. He will ask you to be careful. Ha, ha, ha!” This adds to the mounting discomfort the reader/viewer is starting to feel, regardless of familiarity with the story.The rest of the play more or less follows the narrative of the story, although this version is somewhat more distressing and daunting. We still get no answers as to motive, other than that Montresor blames Fortunato, irrationally, for their interchanging of fortunes.A dramatic reinterpretation of The Facts in the Case of M. Valdemar proves challenging, as the climax of the story features a body dissolving into a putrescent puddle of a corpse. How does one pull that off in a one-act play? Tait relies on the audience using its imagination as to the gory details as much as Poe relied on the reader using his or her imagination. The character of the student Lernl makes copious notes of Pusey's use of magnetism, a precursor of hypnotism, on the dying Valdemar and then reads them aloud for our benefit. We do not actually see the “outflow of a yellowish plasma-like substance from underneath [Valdemar's] eyelids,” rather we hear Pusey describe the condition to the nurse during one of Pusey's many, somewhat long speeches.It is uncertain if this format would translate well to the stage or not. In high school we are reminded that a play is better seen than read, which is a helpful thing to keep at the fore when reading a book of plays. Much would depend on the particular staging and the actors' reading of The Facts in the Case of M. Valdemar; the reading of the play, however, proves to be at times engaging, at times lackluster.The decision to change the gender of The Black Cat's unreliable narrator from male to female was gratifying; after all, women can be violent alcoholics, too. The decision to split the narrator into two separate characters representing one person was also very appealing. “Margaret” and “Peggy” are identically dressed and speak to each other throughout the play. They often contradict each other in terms of fact and tone. The character of “Person” acts as narrator only in the beginning and end, bookending the tale with rational commentary, something you do not get from the main characters. The decline into alcoholism and madness is as steady as Poe's original, even with the more contemporary Peggy and Margaret having the benefit of modern psychology. The play is dark and amusing and requires very little by way of staging, as the dialogue carries the momentum briskly, without lulls.The Lovers is based on 1834's “The Assignation.” It simplifies the narrative but remains true to the story of two lovers who seem sometimes to resemble Jay Gatsby and Daisy Buchanan, but end up like Romeo and Juliet, poisoning themselves for love in a suicide pact. Set in early nineteenth-century Venice, the play begins and ends with the dates and particulars of various Venice floods, reflecting the perils of the city and the mystery of why people continue to live and build in that “moon-wracked Elysium by the sea.”The action centers on the Marchesa Mentoni, who drops her baby into a foul Venice canal from a second-floor balcony. When the Nick Carraway / Friar Laurence character, Robert, loses an oar from his gondola during the search and rescue of the baby, we can see that he is going to lose control of everything and proceed without any kind of guidance. The baby is saved by Martin Leopold, the Marchesa's lover. Is he the baby's father? Or is Mentoni, the cold, sardonic husband of the beautiful Marchesa? We never really know. That mystery dies with the suicides.This is a streamlined version of what can be a difficult story to follow. The haunting atmosphere of the original is still there, however, and readers will appreciate this in a play where setting is so integral to the tone.Memories of August Bedloe is based on the 1844 “A Tale of the Ragged Mountains”—the only Poe story to take place in Virginia. The beginning and denouement are very satisfying, especially for those in the audience who like things wrapped up neatly. That is not to imply that this play is by any means straightforward in the usual sense. Into Poe's tale of mesmerism, the occult, reincarnation (or time travel, depending on how you look at it), chronic morphine use, and British imperial history Tait places the new character of Avimaraka. Avimaraka is an ancient Sanskrit play based on a lost Indian love story. The same-named character in Memories of August Bedloe wanders in and tells his sad tale of his escape as a prisoner in the princess's palace. He has left his heart behind with the princess, however, and now seeks to kill himself. Rejecting drowning in the lush forest pool as the coward's way, he seeks a more dignified method.This story-within-a-story works well, and breaks up Bedloe's narrative of his “excursion to the Ragged Mountains,” where, in a cloud of morphine, he travels to the India of the previous century and fights alongside a group of British soldiers and sepoys during an insurrection of Cheyte Sing.Bedloe's doctor, Dr. Templeton (who has been treating him for many years), is unnerved, and shows him a painting of his old friend Oldeb (Bedloe spelled backward, almost), who had the identical experience and died during the insurrection. Templeton confesses Bedloe's resemblance to Oldeb is what drew him to Bedloe in the first place.The play succeeds in capturing the reader's imagination on many levels. Is Bedloe the reincarnation of Oldeb, or was it time travel? This remains a very popular theme in contemporary pop culture. Did Dr. Templeton accidentally or intentionally kill Bedloe with the poisonous leech? And why? Should not a doctor of his experience be able to tell the difference between the venomous black leech and the medicinal kind? The text poses these and several other questions while tying up the narrative neatly.A Predicament, based on Poe's “A Predicament” and its companion piece “How to Write a Blackwood Article,” follows the text of the two works faithfully. The addition of Marie Bonaparte—real-life psychoanalyst, princess, descendant of Napoleon, and friend to Freud—is a welcome addition to the tale of the ridiculous critic (Signora Psyche Zenobia) who gets decapitated by the minute hand of clock when she sticks her head out of a hole in the steeple of a great Edinburgh cathedral. While this is happening, Zenobia's servant flees and a large rat eats her dog.Marie Bonaparte intersperses Zenobia's tale with sharp, psychoanalytic observations of both Zenobia and Poe. She is qualified, after all, having written Life and Works of Edgar Allan Poe: A Psychoanalytic Interpretation in 1933. Add the occasional limerick by the Chorus and Executioner characters and you have got a verbally quick, comic and surreal production.In all, this dark collection of plays makes for an interesting read on a rainy Sunday, or better yet, an extremely compelling theatrical experience. Good plays based on Poe works are few and far between, and while there are some lulls in the various characters' speeches, in its totality the compilation is satisfying, thought provoking, and fun.