Jason Woods as the queen plans disaster for Casper in The Near Disaster of Jasper & Casper…
It can’t be easy to invent a brand-new fairy tale; even James Lapine and Stephen Sondheim had to rely on the old favorites. But here comes Jason Woods, not only cobbling together an entirely original fantasy with The Near Disaster of Jasper & Casper, but performing all the parts, with distinctive voices and personalities for all the characters. Woods may seize on some familiar plot points, and he’s not always tidy: “Jasper and Casper” don’t rhyme perfectly with “Disaster,” as he seems to have been aiming for. But he knocks himself out to engage the audience.
…and he’s also the hectoring drunkard Cadmus Hexamus…
It’s just Woods on an empty stage, backed by some lively John Williams-y movie music, also credited to him—did he really write all this? Narrating where he must and swiftly shifting among characters and creatures where he can, Woods plunges into the medieval town of Bellalore, on the 32nd of October (yes, the whimsy gets pretty thick). There, amid much suffering of the lower classes, the Festival of the Queen is about to begin.
Unmoved by this is Winifred Isabelle Tatiana Charlotte Higgins. Check out those initials: Yes, she’s a witch—not of the cackling calculating variety, but more like the bubbe from down the block. Her magical powers somewhat limited, Charlotte wants to sneak into the castle and grab the chalice from the palace of Alice the Calloused, which she can use to consort with her late mother. This she accomplishes by transforming herself into a mouse, then, when changing back to her original self, forgetting to put her clothes back on.
Chalice from the palace? Whether The Court Jester film reference is deliberate or not, who knows? But there’s also, if not a flagon, a dragon, with the ability to appear at will. He’s been terrorizing the countryside, although he turns out to be civil and erudite. Festwick Oswald Popinjay, the queen’s supercilious herald, has offered 1,000 gold pieces for the dragon’s capture. Taking up the challenge is Jasper, the utterly ordinary adopted brother of Casper, a rich-voiced ham actor with whom Woods has invested some witty pretentious pronouncements about the the-a-tah.
“Narrating where he must and swiftly shifting among characters and creatures where he can, Woods plunges into the medieval town of Bellalore.”
As in all good fairy tales, everybody wants something: Casper to act, and Jasper to find out who his real parents were. But he’ll set that aside for the moment to find the dragon, aided by the hired wiles of Cadmus Hexamus, a one-eyed souse who knows stuff about dragons. Woods equips Cadmus with a healthy appetite for sandwiches (the club at the Rub a Dub Dub Pub), a healthy lust for naked witches, and a hilarious Scottish accent: “Doonna! Lewk! Back!” And, “No one’s brave enough to go through the Pasture of the Deadly Coos!” That’s cows.
Yes, there are deadly cows, not to mention a Ring of Kings that yields supreme power, a wicked queen bent on destroying Casper, and the origins of the phrase “green room.” And a lot of punning, some of it rather feeble: “He means well.” “The well’s not deep enough.” Woods also borrows from all over: Did he come up with “she was somewhere between 62 and death” by himself, or did it seep in from the Mame cast album? No matter, he’s an engaging storyteller, breathless of delivery and suitably physical: He darts about the stage, but not to excess. Under Michelle Svenson Kindy’s canny direction, he seems a nice guy, and his love of the actor’s art rings clear and true.
…who contemplates the tininess of Winifred, having turned herself into a mouse. Photographs by Ross Rowland.
One complaint. Woods is a trained actor with a trained voice. He can project. Or, that is, we assume he can project, but who can tell with Dave Ferdinand’s excessive sound design (he also did the lighting, which is fine)? Woods wears one of those distracting face mikes, and everything’s too loud. The dragon speaks with a reverb, which makes some dramatic sense, but there’s no reason everybody else has to blast out through speakers. Have we traveled so far beyond the concept of natural sound in the theater that it’s now verboten, or are Woods & Co. catering to a generation of listeners who won’t accept any sound but processed? End of rant.
Anyhow, it’s a boisterous and diverting 85 minutes. A naughty word or two aside, it’s OK for the kids. And, as Woods narrates at the tale’s conclusion, mild spoiler alert, “The poor were fed and given work, the rich shared their wealth, and great value was placed on art, music, and of course theater.” A happy ending!
The production of The Near Disaster of Jasper & Casper at Theatre Row’s Theater Five (410 W. 42nd St., Manhattan) runs through Sept. 18. Evening performances are at 7:30 p.m. Tuesday through Saturday; matinees are at 2 p.m. Saturday and Sunday. For tickets, visit bfany.org/theatre-row.
