The ‘Proof’ of a brave effort
January 14, 2002 | 12:00am
Atlantis Production takes on the daunting task of bringing to Manila one of the most critically-acclaimed plays in Broadway today. David Auburn’s Pulitzer and Tony Awards-winning Proof is its first offering for 2002, following up on its successes in 2001 with Rent and Hedwig and the Angry Inch.
What is unique about this production is that it features Lea Salonga in a non-musical play. Salonga has not performed in a non-musical since Miss Saigon more than a decade ago, making her participation in this drama a rare one.
Proof deals with Catherine’s (Salonga) obsession of whether she inherited her father’s genius and his insanity. Robert (Michael De Mesa), her father flitted in and out of mental coherence for five years, forcing her to abandon college to take care of him. During all those years, he filled 103 notebooks with scribbling, a testament of his derangement. With his father’s death, her sister, Claire (Menchu Lauchengco-Yulo), returns from New York to sort out the family’s properties, while a math professor, Harold "Hal" Dobbs (Joel Trinidad), volunteers to do the same to her father’s papers.
At the heart of Proof is Catherine’s fear of having inherited her father’s insanity. The idea that genius and insanity are related is quite familiar; the drama offers its own explanation for Catherine’s well-being, as well as trying to break down the stereotype that most mathematicians are male nerds.
The drama’s movement rests greatly on Catherine. It is her search for a proof to her insanity that propels much of the action.
Salonga delivers a feeble Catherine. Auburn writes out clearly Catherine’s angst, and yet she provides little to convince the audience of her character’s dilemma. You would expect her to be overflowing with hurt, with bile, yet there is nothing behind her anger. You hear her exploding in perfectly cadenced English, but the whole characterization fails to take off, creating an unwanted sense of understatement. You feel Salonga holding back on Catherine’s emotions.
The entire drama comes to a halt at the point when Catherine announces that she wrote a proof for prime numbers that Hal thinks her father Robert wrote. The scenes after the intermission drives home the point of Catherine’s genius and her anger and disappointment when she encounters from her disbelieving sister Claire and Hal, but we get none of that. The character, and the drama, remains static.
In contrast to Salonga’s Catherine, Lauchengco-Yulo pulls out all the stops in her delineation of Claire. At times her acting might have been arch, but it only emphasizes the disparity between Catherine’s and Claire’s personalities. Where Salonga’s character is hollow, Lauchengco-Yulo’s is so much more vibrant.
The drama is rounded out by De Mesa and Trinidad; they are efficient in the projection of their characters. Trinidad fits Hal perfectly, the math portage in search for material that will assure him of a little fame. De Mesa tries to add life to his few scenes, but his repartee with Salonga is often cold.
Much of our disappointment with Proof is cultural in nature. The idea of children caring for their parents in old age might not be an American virtue, but to many Filipinos the issue is moot. The squabbling between Catherine and Claire is familiar, but makes for a rather predictable plot.
Bobby Garcia has made a brave attempt to bring the latest plays from abroad. While Proof might not really be up the alley of most Filipino play goers, the exercise has proven that we have the talent to realize important foreign productions.
Lea Salonga is also featured in Lea Salonga: The Broadway Concert on Jan. 31 and Feb. 1 at the PICC. Guests include Calvin Millado, Michael de Mesa, Carlo Orosa and the San Miguel Foundation for the Performing Arts Orchestra. Gerard Salonga is musical director. Call Ticketworld at 891-56-10 for inquiries and reservations.
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