Taproot Theatre opens its 2012 season with Molière’s “Tartuffe,” running Feb. 3-March 3, with previews on Feb. 1-2.
Jesse Notehelfer, Frank Lawler, and Don Brady. Photo by Erik Stuhaug, Taproot Theatre.
Molière’s comic masterpiece brings us the imposter Tartuffe, a con artist extraordinaire who oozes piety and charm. Will his hypocrisy be discovered before Orgon’s household is turned on its head? This famous farce is a cautionary tale told with lightning-quick wit, complete with star-crossed lovers, a badgering grandma and a plot that could be ripped from the headlines C or a Saturday night comedy show.
Tartuffe scandalized many of Molière’s contemporaries and was banned in 1664. Molière himself believed that, “As the duty of comedy is to correct men by amusing them, I believed that in my occupation I could do nothing better than attack the vices of my age by making them ridiculous…” and in his first appeal to the King wrote that, “since hypocrisy is, without doubt, one of the most common, the most harmful, and the most dangerous of these, I thought, Sire, that I would render no small service to all the honorable men of your kingdom if I were to make a comedy that would discredit the hypocrites and present all the artificial gestures that these worthy folk display…”
“Tartuffe” is directed by Karen Lund and features a cast of Charissa Adams, Don Brady, Ryan Childers, Solomon Davis, Nathan Jeffrey, William Hamer, Frank Lawler, Ruth McRee, Jesse Notehelfer and Josh Smyth.
