Tartuffe - NYTW ★★★

The best stories never get old; they simply bide their time until the world needs them again.

Take Tartuffe. It tells the tale of a lowlife grifter who uses religious hypocrisy to tear family, friends, and future relationships apart in order to fatten his pockets. Molière may have written his classic comedy hundreds of years ago, but its themes and ideas feel uncomfortably at home in the current moment in the good ole US of A, so much so that the classic has returned in not one but two New York revivals this autumn. The first, starring André De Shields, had a limited run in October. Now New York Theatre Workshop has returned with a new version by Lucas Hnath, starring Matthew Broderick as the titular rascal.

This new take is a mixed bag, hilarious one moment and bafflingly uneven the next. As Madame Pernelle, Bianca Del Rio gets the ball rolling with a breathless and perfectly delivered extended monologue where she announces the numerous faults of everyone with whom she is sharing oxygen. Imperious and hilarious, Del Rio leaves all the other characters and the audience breathless in her wake. Then the grande Madame exits the stage, not to return until the last minutes of the play. She is missed, and make no mistake, she knows it, because her late return gets applause from the audience and gives the show a needed jolt of energy.

So why is the play’s biggest scold, who bookends the play, making the biggest impression? It’s not for lack of a talented cast. David Cross (Tobias in Arrested Development) is terrific as Orgon, the delusional, duped head of the family, as are downtown theater stalwarts Amber Gray (Hadestown) and Francis Jue (a recent Tony winner for Yellow Face), who play Orgon’s wife, Elmire, and his brother-in-law, Cleante. Those two can always be depended on to find the most of any comedic moment, and they do.

As Orgon’s children, Damis and Mariane, Ryan J. Haddad demonstrates perfect comic timing in and out of the closet, and Emily Davis, preciously dressed head to toe in bright pink, serves a buffet of hilariously sad faces that need to be turned into memes. And Ikechukwu Ufomadu, as Valère, Mariane’s betrothed, is so charming that his grin becomes impossibly infectious.

All the aforementioned cast seem to be performing in a different show than Lisa Kron (as the indomitable maid Dorine) and Broderick. Kron appears to be playing everything at a different level of realism in comparison to the rest of the far more mannered cast; it mostly works because she still manages to grab laughs aplenty. More problematic is Broderick’s approach to Tartuffe, who here is a true nebbish, a 17th-century Leo Bloom hard on his luck but still quietly hustling. There’s no question Broderick knows his way around a comic line, and he too gets his guffaws, but his portrayal works squarely against Molière’s clever structure in which everyone talks about Tartuffe until he makes his big, bold entrance in the middle of the play. Hnath’s adaptation has been reduced to a chirpy two hours, and when Broderick enters at almost the halfway mark, his presence is so muted and matter-of-fact that it becomes genuinely confusing as to how this man has weaseled his way so deeply into this family. Tartuffe needs menace and mystery, and this one lacks both.

Director Sarah Benson knows how to navigate laughs in the face of absurd religiosity (her work on last year’s Teeth was exquisite), but with this production’s abundance of awkward moments and staging, it’s evident something’s gone awry this time. That too goes for the weird transition choreography by Raja Feather Kelly and the curiously inert set by dots, neither of which help the actors or Hnath’s script, which, with one too many questionable verse rhymes, lacks some of the discipline of his other excellent plays.

This Tartuffe is likely one that will sharply divide audiences, but overall the production’s attributes make it an occasion worth attending. All these very talented artists have baked a theatrical soufflé that may have fallen a bit flat but still offers plenty of tasty bites.