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Betrayal It is with a combination of mystery and intimacy that NRP presents its final show of the season, Harold Pinter's Betrayal. The director, Anne Gardiner, delivers to the audience an eye-caressing, chilly production, starring Ron Lacey, Paul Kandarian and Lisa Driscoll. This three-character drama, a study of marital infidelity told in reverse chronological order, is deceptive in its linear clarity. Likely the most accessible of Mr. Pinter's major works, ''Betrayal'' draws you into a situation you think you know all too well: the romantic triangle. But by unsettling degrees, you realize that not one of the trio involved in that relationship knows the whole story of what has happened. Mr. Pinter reveals, in his unusual time reversal, just how unknowable we are to each other. The work's nine scenes, in discreetly staggered revelations, make apparent that everyone has lied to everyone else. The plot of ''Betrayal'' is as simple as its characters are not. Jerry (Ron Lacey), a literary agent, is the lover of Emma (Lisa Driscoll), who runs an art gallery and is married to Robert (Paul Kandarian), a book publisher and Jerry's best friend. The evening begins with a meeting between Jerry and Emma two years after their relationship has ended and then proceeds backward. It ends eight years earlier, with the moment in which Jerry first declares his love to Emma. There are
distinct images that stay with you from this production, developing
like photographic negatives in the memory: Mr. Lacey, as the lover,
Jerry, looking in bewilderment at his best friend's revelations,
or the disconcerting moment he discovers his own betrayal. Mr Lacey
portrays Jerry as a charming man caught in the bewildering murkiness
of daily life. Then there is the image of Robert, the betrayed husband,
clever and cruel, as characterized in Mr. Kandarian's delivery which
with a new posture, a tilt of the head suddenly reveals his repressed
pain and icy rage. Finally, the struggle within Ms. Driscoll as
she regards the two men in her life with divided affection; she
becomes a woman both mysterious and knowing. Then with comic relief,
into all of this lying appears the Italian waiter, Joe Nelson, who
brings warmth and humor into this icy setting. The cool minimalist set by Max Verga. 1970'2 Costumes: Merrie Mizaras & Ron Lacy, Stage Manager: Joe Nelson, Lighting by WW Lighting, Prop Mistress: Janice Sisti, Assistant Stage Manager & Box Office: Jeff Neustadter, Stage Crew: Holly Leach. |
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