Citadel’s The Three Musketeers has swashbuckling on full display

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The Citadel’s last show of the season will please theatre-goers looking for a night of light entertainment and heavy swordplay. Furthermore, The Three Musketeers succeeds in putting a number of extremely beautiful hats on the classic tale of male camaraderie that features all the major themes of humanity,
including love, honour and stolen jewels.

Playing in the Shoctor until May 12, the co-production with Vancouver’s Arts Club (adapted by Catherine Bush from the 1844 novel by Alexandre Dumas) is a grand spectacle in many ways.

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There’s a cast of 17, several of whom play multiple characters. Cory Sincennes has created a simple but highly theatrical set mounted on a turntable that spins towering beams, stairs and a doorway into all manner of different locations. His costumes are awe-inspiring, including a coordinated, black leather ensemble for the titular soldiers that would be right at home on the runway of any fashion show, now or then.

Sincennes’ headgear — from a bouncing wig of tight curls on Queen Anne to the purple and feathered extravagance that is King Louis’s take on the cavalier — was so absorbing that I found myself missing lines when they flounced from the room.

No matter. The script was replete with its diabolical machinations — you could almost hear Nadine Chu’s teeth grind when her character, Mme. De Treville, mentions the evil Cardinal Richelieu (Scott Bellis) — is unchallenging and easy to follow.

To wit. Set in 1628, the story sees a young country bumpkin named D’Artagnan (the balletic and engaging Daniel Fong) arrive in Paris with a mission to join the French King’s Musketeers, an elite corps of soldiers loyal to King Louis XIII. He is foiled early on when he runs into Rochefort (not to be confused with the cheese and played with a sullen sneer by John Ullyatt) who steals his letter of introduction to the head of the famous troop, Mme. De Treville.

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D’Artagnan must prove himself to be taken on by the ne plus ultra of French fighters, Porthos (Alexander Ariate), Aramis (Braydon DowlerColtman) and Athos (Darren Martins).  Along the way, D’Artagnan falls in love, has his heart broken and must seek vengeance.

Stabbings notwithstanding, Bush’s adaptation of the script goes some distance toward making the Dumas novel (replete with misogyny as one would expect) acceptable to the modern palate. Director Daryl Cloran has put female characters into roles traditionally played by men where possible.

The show takes a light tone for most of the evening and the laughs are owing in large part to Edmonton’s own Farren Timoteo. The lithe local consumes the audience’s attention whenever he is on stage in one of two roles. As the vain and self-obsessed King Louis, he is a faintly ridiculous dancer (kudos to choreographer Anna Kuman). As the lackey Planchet, he turns out to be an unexpectedly fearsome fighter, even without a sword. Alexandra Lainfiesta plays Planchet’s paramour, Kitty, with a deft touch. She shows what a fine comic actor can do with just four words, “oh no” and “good luck.”

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While the story is somewhat complex, Cloran keeps the multiple betrayals, backstabbing and kissing of rings moving at a brisk pace. The writing is crisp, clean and occasionally amusing.

“I will not stand here and be insulted,” says D’Artagnan when Rochefort calls him boorish and unrefined.

“Then by all means…take a seat,” replies Rochefort.

Still, the pen is not nearly as mighty as the sword in The Three Musketeers, which I saw on the last night of previews. The show would be dull were it not for nine, count ‘em, nine fight scenes seamlessly choreographed by fight director Jonathan Hawley Purvis. The pedantic among us might wonder why the soldiers are called Musketeers when there is hardly a gun in sight.

But those devoted to grace and glamour will be grateful for the thrust and parry of the blade, and long for a time when one could be taken seriously with one simple phrase.

En garde!

REVIEW

The Three Musketeers
Theatre: The Citadel 9828 101 A Ave.
Written by: Alexandre Dumas, adapted by Catherine Bush
Directed by: Daryl Cloran
When: Through May 12
Tickets: Starting at $35 and available through the box office at 780-425-1820, or online at citadeltheatre.com

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