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 | President Wilson In Paris Director: Jennifer Hagan The Playhouse, season closed By the time you read this, President Wilson would have left Paris, and it's very difficult to describe this one without giving the game away. The less you know, the better, and I certainly don't want to spoil it for you when you next have the opportunity to see this beguiling play. After sending in the troops to save Europe from total destruction in World War I, President Wilson was keen to supervise the birth of the League of Nations and was in Paris in 1919 helping the Europeans carve up the map into manageable bite-size ethnic chunks. We don't see any of this as the action takes place solely in what passes for his Parisian hotel suite. Australian Ron Blair wrote this intriguing thriller in 1974 - two years before his more famous monologue, 'Christian Brothers'. Director Jennifer Hagan is in good company. Henry Szeps OAM was an outstanding President. As I might imagine Wilson, Szeps captured the diplomat, the righteous patriotic American, and presidential dignity layered over the homespun Virginian. You may know Szeps as the dentist in the now-classic TV series, 'Mother and Son'. Deborah Kennedy as Wilson's wife Edith was a comfortable match for Szeps: she was the ringleader of the trio on stage and controlled the action. Colonel House, Wilson's Texan advisor, was played to the hilt by the spunky Henry Nixon. Tasmanian-born designer Jamie Clennett did a nice job with the set - as authentic as a Parisian suite should be - and knew that Mr and Mrs President were dapper dressers. What the play is really about is power and pretense. After a few minutes some really odd things happen and you're hooked into a great yarn.  | |
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