I hate Tartuffe

No, this is not some wry play on Paul Rudnick's I Hate Hamlet.  It turns out that I basically despise the structure and plot of Tartuffe, whereas I think The Misanthrope (a slightly later play) still offers some pretty insightful material.

As far as the overall experience, it was pretty mixed.  I liked the fact that Soulpepper (or truly the Young Centre for the Performing Arts in Toronto's Distillery Historic District) has a modern lobby that is almost spacious enough for all the theatre-goers.  This is generally a problem at so many theatres where it is just miserable to be pressed for space while waiting for what seems like forever for the house to open.  And the crowd skewed fairly young, which is a great sign.  What was bad was that the two main transit options had major flaws in them.  I took the 72C bus and walked under the Gardiner as directed, but the sidewalks were all torn up and I had to cross roads twice without any traffic lights and then double back when what was left of the sidewalk had been completely fenced off.  As a pedestrian option, it was shit.  Then on the way back, the King streetcar has been rerouted for another few months, so I had to walk up to Queen, which was a bit annoying.  Maybe it is just another sign that I am to avoid Soulpepper this year and check back next year.  (I am bummed that last season looked absolutely amazing -- Angels in America, Ayckbourn's The Norman Conquests and Fugard's The Road to Mecca -- and I definitely would have subscribed.  This year nothing really catches my fancy -- and I was so let down by Tartuffe.)

I should say that the acting wasn't really the problem.  I did think the direction was to play it a little overbroad and even a bit like a cartoon, and that wasn't to my taste.  However, the actor playing Tartuffe did a very good job of putting on the mask of false piety (and even a bit of unctuousness), and then later revealing just how terrible and forceful he was underneath. Orgon's wife Elmire was well-played, and I thought the first attempted seduction scene was well done.  Even at that point, I was starting to tune out because Orgon was thick as a brick, and I really hated the reminder that women were nothing more than chattel at that moment in time, but I was still more or less hanging in there.  It was the turn of events after Tartuffe is unmasked where I basically lost interest in the play, and I'll get to that in a minute.  While the maid Dorine was just a bit too saucy to be believable, I thought she was the other stand-out in the play, though again directed just a bit too broad for me.

SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS

So to keep you from making the same mistake I did, I will work through what I hated about the play.  I don't find simpletons particularly interesting, which is why I have never been remotely interested in Forrest Gump.  Intelligent or semi-intelligent people being duped are somewhat more interesting, though this can still be a one-trick pony of a play or movie.  But there comes a point (say after Tartuffe's seduction is revealed and he even admits he was at fault and should leave) where a normal, halfway sane person would listen to others and not double-down by disinheriting his son and ignoring his wife.  It is the too stupid to be believed threshold, and Orgon crossed it fairly early in the play.  (Actually, I already hated Orgon when it was revealed he cared far more about Tartuffe than his wife; even when Dorine upbraided him about it, she is brushed off.) In this case, he is basically too stupid to live (having at least 4 good advisers whom he ignores), and I didn't have any sympathy for him, though it was a shame about his family.  If I was watching TV I would have turned it off and I probably would have left if this were a movie.  And I seriously thought about leaving at intermission (my ears were actually hot I was so angry), but I did want to see how Tartuffe's downfall came about.

Speaking of movies, it did not help that a few weeks ago I saw Satyajit Ray's The Holy Man, which does brilliantly in one hour what it takes Molière 2.5 hours to do badly.  And The Holy Man has a satisfying ending, which Molière completely failed to provide.  So onward.

Elmire hatches a plot to have Tartuffe try to seduce her again with Orgon in the room.  While Tartuffe suspects some treachery, he eventually falls prey to his lust and comes close to consummating the deed.  One woman in the balcony actually burst out "Fucking shit" when Orgon simply would not come out from under the table.  So I don't think I was the only one that thought the pacing was really problematic.  Moliere has Orgon say that he was paralyzed by learning how wrong he was and his mind was whirling.  Fair enough, but he still should have come out earlier to stop the rape of his wife.  Well, in the end he comes out just in the nick of time.  Much relieved laughter from the audience, but none from me.

For half a second, it looks like the trick has worked, and then Tartuffe changes into a different character and says that no, he isn't leaving, that he will turn them out of house.  And this is where things totally go off the rails.  (Though I can sort of understand Molière wanted to tease the audience since in a normal play this would be the turn, leading to the happy ending.)  But really, what rank moron would hand over the deed to his own house while he was still alive?  I don't believe that for a second and it obviously ruins the plot of the play.  But then Molière raises the stakes by introducing a box of treacherous letters that Orgon held for an acquaintance but that he then gave over to Tartuffe for safe keeping.  Umm exqueeze me?  Introducing some key plot point this late in the game (that not even his wife was aware of) is such a cheat.  But it gets worse.

Orgon's mother comes over and then she won't believe the terrible things that Tartuffe has done.  All this is just to allow Dorine to essentially say "sucks to not be believed, doesn't it?"  But obviously the apple didn't fall far from the tree, and she is also dumb as mud.  I actually sensed the audience turning at this point, getting a bit fed up.  If the director was sensible, he would have completely cut this unnecessary bit from the play.  Okay, she quickly changes her tune when the baliff turns up to kick them out of the house, but it is still deeply unsatisfying.

The letters turn out to be just as dangerous as Orgon suspected, and he is about to flee the country when Tartuffe shows up and points them out to the King's Officer.  How the worm has turned, and there are a couple of good lines between Orgon and Tartuffe at this point (not enough to salvage the play obviously).  So how will this end?  How will the tables be turned?

And then a little golden carriage roles out and the King's Officer reads a message literally covered with gold sparkles.  The message is that Tartuffe is to be arrested and the deeds returned to Orgon.  It so transpires that the king in his infinite wisdom knew that Tartuffe was a trickster and just needed more proof, so he let things all play out as they did until it was nearly too late.  So perhaps a nod or two to The Tempest, which as I already pointed out does have its own shortcomings due to the lack of any real threat to Prospero.  Or one could point out that in some ways this isn't that far off from the Book of Job, which is just one damn thing after another until finally God steps in and makes it all better, which is unsatisfying on so many levels, not least of which is God just stands by and lets Job's children be killed off, whereas Molière has the king intervene before anyone really gets hurt.

I will say that I give props to the director for having at least a couple of actors, including Dorine, look totally stunned at this turn of events, as golden confetti rains down upon them.  The happy resolution does come out of nowhere.  It reinforces Molière's somewhat sycophantic relationship to Louis XIV (who was basically the only one who kept him from being excommunicated over this play!), i.e. even if the Church is full of hypocrites, the monarchy is still just and all-knowing.  And it is a complete cheat on every level, from a dramatic point of view.  It easily takes the crown from Shakespeare's As You Like It as the most deeply unsatisfying ending to a major play I have ever seen.  I was just so disgusted with the play itself, I could barely force myself to clap for the actors.  Most people did enjoy themselves (or at least convinced themselves they had a good time), but I was not one of them.

So you have been warned.  If you largely go to plays for their plot (and in fairness most people do not), then Tartuffe is one to be avoided.