Northlight Theatre’s Miss Bennet: Christmas at Pemberley is deftly crafted, a thoroughly engaging comedic riff on Pride & Predjudice, Jane Austen’s early 19th century classic.
It is also a refreshing antidote to a truth universally known: that Chicago stages yield slim pickin’s for legitimate drama this time of year. Nothing against A Christmas Carol, but, bah humbug.
Even better, though: Miss Bennet is laugh out loud funny. It picks up two years after Pride & Predjudice left off. Bookish spinster Mary Bennet (Emily Berman) meets her match in a scholarly young Oxford grad Arthur de Bourgh (Erik Hellman). The chemistry between these brainy characters is vividly rendered on stage by Berman and Hellman.
In short order the two become the center of the action, and the life of the play. (I was reminded of Big Bang Theory’s Sheldon & Amy) Another real stand out is Bri Sudia as Anne de Bourgh, who commands attention and obedience as she competes unsuccessfully with Miss Bennet for Arthur.
Must one be conversant in Austen's ouvre to get this show? Decidedly not. You just need a funny bone.
Playwrights Lauren Gundeson and Margot Melcon have concocted a classic comedy of manners, with a dash of farce. They tread lightly on the Regency English while keeping it clever and witty, injecting various comic tropes - misplaced letters, props imbued with humor in the course of the action - and offering a dramatic intrigue that builds to pique the audience's interest as Act I ends. Just like the old days.
This play is set in a time when the English people were first adopting the tannenbaum from Germany, allowing a Christmas tree to reasonably appear on stage - conveniently enough for seasonal marketing purposes. Anne de Bourgh showers the spruce in whithering disdain, to great comic and dramatic effect. Perhaps that is why I liked her so much.
The production is exceptionally detailed, with intensively styled Regency finery for men and women by Melissa Torchia, and a set by Rick and Jacqueline Penrod that would be at home on the cover of Architectural Digest.
Running through December 18 at Northlight Theatre, this show comes highly recommended for the season.
