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Every enduring play is about us - you and me, breathing the polluted air of this century and struggling with loves and rages and doubts that have afflicted Western society since ancient Greece. If they weren't, "Oedipus" and "King Lear" and "Desire Under the Elms" could remain in the vaults, safely and irrelevantly collecting dust.
"Marat/Sade" reflects many eras. It's set in 1808, it depicts an event from the bloody revolution 15 years before, and writer Peter Weiss hurled it into the world in 1963. But mostly, it shows us our troubled times.
That's why Carolina Actors Studio Theatre has revived it with intelligence, relentless energy and a disturbing intimacy that makes theatergoers feel more than ever like voyeurs.
The full title is "The Persecution and Assassination of Jean-Paul Marat as Performed by the Inmates of the Asylum of Charenton under the Direction of the Marquis de Sade." The Marquis, an inmate at the institution, has written a play depicting the 1793 murder of Marat by a French country girl named Charlotte Corday, who felt he'd betrayed the revolution he helped to organize.
The German-born Weiss moved to Sweden at 21 on the eve of World War II and eventually became a Swedish citizen. When he wrote this piece, capitalism and national socialism and communism had all failed to provide humankind with liberty and security. So he wrote this long, often dogmatic but vital play, pitting the idealistic but hopelessly frustrated Marat against cynical de Sade, who has renounced all ideals.
Because the inmates of the asylum act out de Sade's play, we get a creepy feeling watching them. The girl who enacts Corday is a narcoleptic; her conspirator, Duperret, is a sex fiend with a nasty itch in both senses of the word; other inmates gibber and roar and convulse, and we end up feeling like the rich folk who visited madhouses in the 19th century for perverse entertainment.
CAST has a history of performing with absolute conviction, and you'll see that here: Actors in the tiniest parts never break the mood, grimacing and rocking and laughing giddily at nothing. Their final interaction with the audience, heightened by terrific sound and music effects from Alex Mauldin, is overpowering.
Charles LaBorde directed smartly, playing to every inch of the three-sided theater, and also plays de Sade. He's beardless and boorish and nearly bald, and he looks like Nikita Khrushchev exulting in crude, cruel power. (Is this intentional? Khrushchev was premier of the Soviet Union in 1963.)
CAST producer Michael Simmons plays a vigorous Marat, coping fluidly with long, rousing speeches (if often delivering them too softly). Karina Roberts-Caporino is the seductive sleepwalker Corday, and Amanda Nicastro leads the supporting cast as Marat's wife; Nicastro's halting speech, twitching hands and stunted emotions rouse real pathos.
I imagine either political side in America could claim the play these days. The left might say it excoriates people who seize power, enrich themselves, promise improvements in their subjects' lives and deliver nothing. The right might say it warns against overzealous leaders whose promises can never be fulfilled and must end in hardship for all citizens.
The ironic ending celebrates Napoleon Bonaparte, who was on the brink of conquering most of Europe in 1808 and was hailed as the savior of French prosperity and honor. Hearing the mad people sing his praises, we're reminded how he and all political messiahs turn out.
