James McAvoy as Cyrano de Bergerac (left) helps Christian (Eben Figueiredo) woo his cousin, Roxane (Evelyn Miller, center).
When Edmond Rostand’s Cyrano de Bergerac opened in 1897, it was hailed not only for its poetry but for its elaborate sets—one for each of the five acts, from bakery to battlefield—and for its poetry and grandiose passions. Martin Crimp’s version of the story of unrequited love, produced and directed by Jamie Lloyd at BAM, has only the faintest glimmers of any exaltation. More often it’s simply disappointing.
McAvoy stars in Jamie Lloyd’s production of a stripped-down Cyrano de Bergerac at BAM.
The first half (which begins, according to a projection, in 1642 and encompasses the first three of Rostand’s five acts) takes place in Soutra Gilmour’s white-box set on the forestage. Here the cast, mostly in sweatsuits and black leather, recite the lines, converted from the French alexandrines to rap. Cyrano brags about his famous protuberance:
My nose is out―it’s out and proud―
it’s out there―it’s full-volume―loud―
it blasts the world―thrusts and attacks―
my nose is permanently set to max―
Crimp’s conceit is that the weaponry for duels is battling poetry. There are no swords. There is also, notably, no nose. It’s imaginary, as is a bag of gold coins Cyrano throws to pay for disrupting the Hamlet that stars the pompous Montfleury (an amusing Adrian Der Gregorian), an actor he dislikes. And no white plume—Cyrano’s panache. The word is said, but only in the sense of style.
Lloyd enhances the modernist script with a poetry-slam vibe. Actors grab mikes to deliver lines, frequently directly to the audience. But if the passions underlying the grandiloquence of Rostand’s version are still valid today, then it seems condescending to assume that an audience cannot comprehend them without a stripped-down, bare-bones rewrite.
Crimp’s use of rap at least presents cleaner rhymes than the regular thing, which often strains for grotesque “rhymes.” When Michelle Austin’s warm, maternal Ragueneau solicits examples of verse from her baking students, there’s even an inside joke:
The love triangle in Cyrano de Bergerac, from left: Roxane, Christian, and Cyrano himself.
Student: I’m really into the curd
I think curd’s such a great word
the word curd really needs to get heard
and that bit earlier when you stirred the curd
that was cool.
Ragueneau: Thank you, Marie-Louise―thank you immensely―
just remember the things you write
don’t have to always rhyme quite so intensely.
Yet much of the rhyming here feels just as single-minded. And other language is jarringly modern. References to “shopping cart,” “total news blackout” and “gender-neutral” are too clever by half and don’t jibe with 1642. And hearing the F-bomb from Evelyn Miller’s regal and clear-spoken Roxane is unsettling—as anachronistic as a throwaway joke about a film with Steve Martin.
Sometimes, though, the rap approach works. At the siege of Arras, starving and surrounded, the cadets do a rhythmic chant for Cyrano:
Who’s the man we always back?
Cyrano de Bergerac.
Who can take the fucking flak?
Cyrano de Bergerac.
Yet the visual splendor of Cyrano is sorely missing. There are times in theater when one must rely on one’s imagination—believing that half a dozen actors in Coriolanus constitute a mob, for instance—but at other times the lack of visuals impoverishes a production. What would The Lieutenant of Inishmore be with imagined stage blood? Limited by the poetry slam ethos, Lloyd has the actors parade in circles, or lie down on the stage, or, at one point, play a sort of musical chairs. But actors clinging to mikes provide scant excitement visually.
Rap duels substitute for swordfights with Valvert (Nari Blair-Mangat, left) and Cyrano (McAvoy). Photographs by Marc Brenner.
The performers still shine. James McAvoy’s Cyrano begins as an exemplar of toxic masculinity, but he is unquestionably a strapping and vigorous heroic presence. When Cyrano is summoned by Roxane, McAvoy’s hero has a hard time catching his breath while speaking to her. When he duels linguistically with Valvert, he races through rhymes as if he’s singing Stephen Sondheim’s “Getting Married Today.” Later, disguised as a madman, he smoothly assumes various voices. And, after he promises Roxane to protect Christian from bullying soldiers, tears flood his eyes. Pain, passion and skill are brilliantly mixed—it’s a masterly performance.
The rest of the cast have various British accents, and some are easier than others to parse. Tom Edden’s De Guiche, who hounds Roxane to marry him, is every inch a haughty worm. Eben Figueiredo’s Christian is a grinning dolt, although he draws sympathy anyway. “What is this deal with language?” he asks. But his moment of realization that Roxane loves the writer of the letters is played with a quiet nobility.
The impetus for this production is probably well-meant—to introduce a new generation to a great play. But stripping away all the glamour and substituting modern anachronisms doesn’t do Cyrano justice. If the play’s themes are still relevant in 2022, then it should stand on its own feet.
The Jamie Lloyd Company’s Cyrano de Bergerac plays at the Brooklyn Academy of Music through May 22. Evening performances are at 7:30 p.m. Tuesday through Saturday; matinees are at 3 p.m. Sundays. For tickets and information, visit bam.org/Cyrano.
