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| Black-Eyed Susan, Charles Ludlam. |
Charles Ludlam’s special
brand of theatrical campiness was somewhat toned down in this fairly straightforward backstage
farce about a small troupe of barnstorming actors about to perform Hamlet in a small town, and whose lives seem a
reflection of Shakespeare’s characters. The actor playing the Ghost (Jack
Mallory) is the father of the one playing Hamlet (Ludlam). He’s found murdered
with a hatchet in his neck in his dressing room. The action largely concerns
the company’s efforts to find out the murderer. Portions of Hamlet are mixed in with scenes of the
company’s backstage life.
Jokes and silly comic
characters abound, including a would-be-playwright of a stage manager (John D.
Brockmeyer), a sexed-up new actress who plays Ophelia (Black-Eyed Susan), her
actor-lover (Bill Vehr), and Hamlet himself, wearing a blonde wig making him
look more like Carol Channing than the Prince of Denmark.
Mel Gussow laughed at
the comedy, but found it “less well and untidy than the usual Ludlam. . . .
There’s a loss in madness and nonsense but a gain in structure and discipline.”
Julius Novick, however, thought the parodic intentions worthwhile but their
execution sorely lacking. The dialogue was inadequate, he thought, and the thematic concerns
of investigating “the histrionic temperament and theatrical artifice shallowly
developed.” Finally, he observed, “[T]he acting is unmodulated and uninspired.”
