The Alchemist

Schlub and the Mrs. drove through the horrible rain-terrified traffic of DC last Friday to attend a showing of The Alchemist, a Ben Jonson play. I swear, let one bit of precipitation or falling leaf hit the roadways and 95% of the drivers around here get the vapors. At any rate, the Schlub's did their usual thing: enter a restaurant with barely 35 minutes to spare, no reservations, and demand great food at McDonald's speed. Oyumel could not accomodate us, but Cafe Atlantico did, thanks to the delightful French bartender whose name I never caught but who I tipped a whopping $5, dude. Don't spend it all in one place.

At any rate, I'd never seen a Ben Jonson play before, he being the also-ran to that guy from Avon. Interesting character, though, bit of a thug with a murder he managed to avoid swinging for because he could read a Bible verse in Latin. Ah, the judicial proofs of the Elizabethan Age.

The play was...good. I hesitate because it wasn't The Taming of the Shrew good, but tweren't the fault of the actors, 'twas the material. Jonson relied on a lot of sight gags, a la costume changes, for his chuckles and those were amusing, but, you know, c'mon. The first time the hippie pharmacist (named Able Drugger. That Jonson, funny guy) and the guru came on stage was good for a laugh, but only once. There were some acting standouts: Robert Creighton played Ananias as a crazed, Bible thumpin' Holy-Spirit-jigging deacon, which is a bit of an inside joke, given that Ananias was the first in a long line of greedy Jimmy Swaggart types in Christianity . David Sabin was Sir Epicure Mammon (again, that Jonson, funny guy) and he cracked me up with his Donald Trump get-up and his Leo McKern mannerisms.

So, overall, a good night. Just not great.