Theatre: Doubt draws audience into being the judge

Oh God, what am I in for, you think, as the priest stands at the front of the stage and addresses the audience as his parishioners.

You fear you’re about to be lectured or see a dull piece of Catholic angst. Instead you get a rip-roaring, award-winning drama that will have you thanking God for brilliant playwrights.

Doubt, A Parable, is a swirl of flimsy detail, denial and strong suspicion, set in 1964 in a church school in the Bronx. The mean spirited and strict disciplinarian principal, Sister Aloysius, believes Father Flynn has molested a 12-year-old altar boy. She recruits the young and innocent Sister James to watch for suspicious behaviour.

Playwright John Patrick Shanley sets the scene with a sermon on doubt from the priest, then cleverly has him weaving more sermons out of the accusations that fly around him.

Fiona Ramsay is fabulous as snippy Sister Aloysius, rebuking with a curt word or a sour purse of the lips. She thinks – or at least you have to hope she does – that she is doing good by seeing the worst in everyone. Or has she just become a self-righteous stone-thrower who would have strung up Jesus for turning water into wine?

James MacEwan is also excellent as the engaging Father Flynn.

It’s a gripping plot, and startling when you realise how, once a dislike of another person is embedded into your brain, even their most innocent action or word can be twisted to bolster your prejudice.

In Sandton’s intimate Auto & General Theatre on the Square you inevitably find yourself drawn into being the judge as well as the observer. Your brain toys with the same scant evidence, interpretations and opinions, and your view will be as swayed or biased by your own believes as theirs are.

Did the priest interfere with the boy? Well, given the church’s reprehensible record of institutionalised perversion, he probably did. But his accuser is a sour old woman who sees bad in a ballpoint pen, let alone a penis, so her view is already shaped by her dislike for this gregarious man.

Fortunately there’s not too much time to examine your own instincts because the action on stage has you constantly gripped.

Tension builds steadily with whispered confidences in the garden, a meeting called to confront the priest, and the priest shaming such destructive gossip in short and powerful sermons that punctuate the action.

Then comes the firecracker, an electric scene when the principal confronts the priest and demands his resignation. Sparks fly like a clash between a king and queen on a chessboard, each trying to manoeuver the other into defeat.

Ramsay and MacEwan are perfect equals, both brilliant at the fire and brimstone, the doubts and the remorse.

Janna Ramos-Violante as tremulous Sister James is also excellent, a pawn caught between them and unsure who to side with. When I look at people with suspicion I feel I am less close to God, she says. Well ain’t that the truth.

A short scene with Mwenya Kabwe as the mother of the altar boy was marred slightly for me by Kabwe’s roaming eyes. She presents her arguments forcibly, but rarely looks at the sister she is addressing. If that’s a directorial choice meant to imply deference it doesn’t work, because she’s too committed and passionate to be cowed. Still, that’s an odd and very tiny niggle in a fabulous piece of theatre.

The set by Vaughn Sadie works well, with its slightly austere office and a garden so the scenes flow easily from one to another. Lighting by Tina le Roux also strengthens the moods, plunging the stage into darkness when MacEwan steps forward to address the audience.

Director James Cuningham has the emotions and the pace pitched perfectly, and there isn’t a moment when you’re not concentrating on the nuances of the words and interactions.

The play has won numerous awards including a Pulitzer Prize for Drama, and was turned into a movie starring Meryl Streep and Philip Seymour Hoffman.

Its full title is Doubt, A Parable, but that sounds awfully preachy. In the excellent hands of these actors and director, there’s no doubt that it’s a damn fine drama. DM

Photos by Philip Kuhn. Doubt, A Parable runs at Sandton’s Auto & General Theatre on the Square until August 15. Tickets from the box office on 011-883-8606,?or www.strictlytickets.com?

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