Review by Chad Jones for The Oakland Tribune, published December 10, 2001

Shotgun Players emerge victorious in sublime `Trojan War'

Three Stars - Timely and trenchant

By Chad Jones
STAFF WRITER

If French playwright Jean Giraudoux were writing today and submitted a grant to the National Endowment for the Arts to produce his play ``There Will Be No Trojan War," chances are he would be red-flagged and ultimately denied.

You see, there are certain things the government does and does not want us to talk about these days. We've learned this from all the hubbub surrounding Berkeley Repertory Theatre's in-limbo grant to produce Tony Kushner's Afghanistan-set ``Homebody/Kabul."

The administration probably wouldn't be too crazy about Giraudoux's clever, intelligent satire about the stupidity, complexity and ultimate inevitability of war.

Written in 1935, when Giraudoux could feel the Nazi threat looming, the play is best known as ``Tiger at the Gates," the title given to the first American production in 1955.

Though Berkeley's Shotgun Players are using Christopher Fry's excellent original translation, the company has chosen to call the show ``There Will Be No Trojan War," which is the first line of the play and is actually closer to the original French title.

Whatever you call it, this play is definitely of the moment.

Shotgun had planned to produce a new play by local writer Adam Bock in its December slot. That production will be part of the new season, which begins in March at Shotgun's new home in the downtown Berkeley's Gaia Building.

This fortuitous program change gives us the right play at the right time and allows Shotgun to do what it does best: smart, solid, no-nonsense theater.

A wonderful writer who could embrace history and philosophy but still keep his language full of humor, humanity and poetry, Giraudoux is not so much a screechy anti-war activist as he is a keen observer of human behavior.

Mankind, it would seem, has been cocky, belligerent and prone to war since the beginning of time. Giraudoux take us back to an ancient world and sets his play at the cusp of the Trojan War.

The Trojan prince Paris (John Patrick Moore) has kidnapped Greek beauty Helen (Roxana Ortega) because, as he says here, ``I have had enough of local women."

Paris' brother Hector (the superb Malcolm Brownson) and Hector's wife Andromache (the equally good Beth Donohue) are adamantly against waging war against the Greeks. Hector, a decorated war hero, has had a recent change of heart. During his last battle, he had a revelation that war is nothing more than a form of suicide, so he does everything in his power to prevent more bloodshed.

But governments and patriotic citizens, Giraudoux tells us, are not built to stand by and be thought of as weak, so Hector must fight a massive battle of wits, wills and words to stave off more carnage. Given what we know of Greek and Trojan history, Hector's struggle is in vain, and the play's title, ``There Will Be No Trojan War," is acutely ironic.

Among Hector's foes are his father, King Priam (Fred Ochs), the poet and senator Demokos (a wonderfully belligerent Clive Worsley) and drunken Greek sea captain Ajax (Michael Cheng).

Hector's most acid-tongued ally in his effort to quell the blood lust is his mother Hecuba, played by the droll Trish Mulholland. And one of Hector's greatest rivals, Ulysses (Michael Asberry), turns out to be an incredibly eloquent peer.

For 2-1/2 hours, director Patrick Dooley and his solid cast command our attention by not overstating the characters. The cast plays the humor when appropriate and infuses Giraudoux's text with passion.

There's not a whole lot of action here, but Dooley's staging on Sylvia Dawkins' simply sculpted set is dynamic and lively. If the Eighth Street Studio Theatre is overheated or cramped, it only heightens the intensity of the play.

``There Will Be No Trojan War" ends an excellent Shotgun season on a true grace note. The production is strong, but the evening ultimately belongs to Giraudoux, an insightful, entertaining writer who observes that as long as we remain human and subject to the whims of destiny, peace is not an option.

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Original article on the web at
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