| Maggie Long performs as Jane Eyre, narrating her life. (Photos: Enoch Wu/Sentinel-Tribune) |
"Jane Eyre" has an awful lot of plot – twists and all, misery and mystery to fit into just over
two hours of theater.
Using a theatrical adaptation of the Charlotte Bronte novel, the Black Swamp Players manage to sweep
through the story of the much put upon, yet feisty Jane’s rise in a production that opens tonight at 8
at First United Methodist Church in Bowling Green.
"Jane Eyre," directed by Kevin Cagle, opens with little girls jumping rope, and voices emerging
from the wings. These presage the action and characters we are about to meet.
Thomas Hischak’s script uses an older Jane Eyre, played by Maggie Long, to narrate the story.
It starts with a very young Jane (Scarlet Frishman) living with her abusive aunt (Erin Hachtel) and two
arrogant cousins. She is an orphan at the mercy of those charged to care for her. Those are both
malevolent – her aunt and later the malicious school superintendent Mr. Brocklehurst (Stephen Becker),
or nurturing – her aunt’s maid Bessie (Allison Needles) and the school mistress Miss Temple (Kate
Frishman).
| The young Jane Eyre, performed by Scarlet Frishman looks on as Mr. Brocklehurst (Stephen Becker), sides with her abusive aunt Mrs. Reed (Erin Hachtel) and demonizes Eyre for her thoughts and actions. |
Scarlet Frishman’s Jane is torn by her desire to be patient and obedient and a temper that flares when
she is wronged.
When the teenage Jane, played by Katelyn Huffman, arrives at Thornfield to be a governess she comes upon
the master of the house Rochester played with menacing dignity by Eric Hayes.
The puzzling Rochester brings together the good and bad forces that have been buffeting young Jane. The
casting with the slight Huffman next to the towering Rochester fits their places in the world.
He a hulking, powerful presence, she a charity case. It highlights both her vulnerability, but also
serves to show the bravery of her character as Frishman’s Jane speaks candidly, almost tactlessly to her
hulking master. For his part, Hayes lets the warmth of an oft-bruised heart melt his brusque, icy
exterior.
Throughout the narrator stands off to the side, giving insight into Jane’s thoughts and nudging the plot
along. Long’s reading is steady, dispassionate, as if she is subsuming emotion to set off the drama and
color on stage.
Much of that color is provided by those is secondary roles. Becker’s school superintendent is striking as
the venal, sanctimonious Brocklehurst, so much so that I wished I’d witnessed his eventual downfall and
not just heard about it.
| The young Jane Eyre, performed by Scarlet Frishman, finds a friend in fellow schoolmate Helen Burns (Skylar Frishman), who comforts her during a scene. |
Melissa Kidder as Miss Halifax is cheerful yet all business, yet a secret, the linchpin of the plot,
shadows everything she says.
Grace Easterly is both bubbly and catty as Blanche Ingram, Rochester’s aristocratic fiancee, and Kate
Frishman is withering as her mother. Anderson Lee puts some blood in the veins of the rigid clergyman
St. John Rivers. Megan Carmen plays Adele as sweet, but spoiled, yet not quite bratty.
These characters help pull us into the emotional world of Jane Eyre by providing foils for Jane’s
emerging awareness of where her heart leads her.
All this inner and exterior action leads to a fitting emotional climax and the denouement of two little
girls jumping rope, reciting a rhythm about finding true love.
