Under the Gaslight, Seattle's Empty Space's production of the first play from the king of melodrama Augustin Daly, ends its brief run at the Kirkland Performance Center July 16. Performances began July 13. The production transferred from the Empty Space, where it ran May 31-July 9.
In Daly's 1867 script, the beautiful young Laura Courtland, belle of New York society, is plunged into poverty by a terrible secret from her past. She must claw her way back to the top while facing evil villains and finding her perfect hero. Under the Gaslight introduced to the world the oft-parodied melodramatic idea of a heroine being tied to the railroad tracks by a fiendish, moustache-twirling villain while a train bears down on them. In his time, Daly adapted over 90 plays but suffered from his unwillingness to publish any of them.
In an effort to create a sense of 19th Century theatre-going, Empty Space artistic director Eddie Levi Lee has interspersed the action with olios, 19th Century variety acts used to fill out the production and satisfy the average customer's desire for all forms of entertainment. Olios could be anything from comedy sketches to popular songs to animal imitations.
Starring in Gaslight are Anthony Curry, V. Joy Lee, Jeffrey L. Treadwell, Imogen Love and Bhama Roget.
The design team includes Carol Wolfe Clay (sets), Misty Reubens (costumes), Timothy Wratten (lighting) and Nathan Anderson (sound, musical direction, original compositions). For tickets in Kirkland ($26-$14), call (425) 893-9900. The Kirkland Performance Center is located at 350 Kirkland Avenue. The KPC is on the web at http://www.kpcenter.org.
-- By Christine Ehren
