Well! I am home from the theatre.

I saw Remy Bumppo's production of Les Liaisons Dangereuses, which was very long but held my attention and made me laugh, and that's not something most films do, so well done them. It's a difficult play to do badly, in some ways, because the dialogue just clips right along and unless you just plain have bad actors, it's hard to make it boring. Still, Remy Bumppo is a reliable source for good theatre, and I've yet to see a bad play by them. One can't give the script all the credit.

I will say that previews are tough to attend sometimes, not so much because the play is still rough around the edges (it was; that's expected, and actually relished a bit) but because I forget that there is a...shall we say a certain sort of older person who attends previews and Sunday matinees. They were the bane of my existence when I worked for the box office and now just annoy me by talking, eating chocolates, reeking of Old Spice -- and walking all over the stage, which makes me insane. GET OFF THE FUCKING STAGE.

Also, god save me from ever being That Guy, the one who sees bare tits on stage in the first act and spends all of intermission giggling about it. Jesus. You'd think by the time they hit sixty most men who are interested in breasts have seen a few and could move on.

The set, which is always closest to my heart, was -- well, it was workmanlike. It did what it was supposed to do and didn't get in the way. Sometimes I guess that's all you an ask. There was a lot I would have done differently, particularly the floor, which was painted with a fair amount of skill and precision but so darkly that nobody noticed or cared. It looked like a mat floor for a dance troupe. Still, nil desperandum, one doesn't go to the theatre to look at the floors.

I always forget what an excellent play Les Liaisons Dangereuses is (though difficult to spell). Not just as a play, either; I could deconstruct the meaning of it and the various interpretations I've encountered, but it's fairly straightforward and more fun just to watch and experience. The thing is, it's also a good play from the standpoint of a professional: it's easy to make the sets and costuming interesting and it has a lot of really juicy parts for women while requiring very few men, which is not only fairly rare but quite desireable given the balance of women to men in the theatre today. You do have to have a good Valmont, but then they did. I'm sure I've seen him in other productions -- I think he was Figaro in The Marriage of Figaro, which was my first Remy Bumppo play.

At any rate, if you're in Chicago and looking to see a good show, Les Liaisons Dangereuses is a hot ticket and playing for the rest of March and all of April at the Victory Gardens Greenhouse on the north side. Good play, nice space, comfortable chairs with lots of leg room.