[NEohioPAL] Berko review: BEYOND THE HORIZON @ Ensemble

[Roy Berko]

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Each year, Ensemble Theatre selects a classic play to be part of their
season offerings.  Last year it was “The Iceman Cometh,” which was
recognized by the Cleveland Critics Circle for "Superior Achievement for a
Non-Musical Production."  This year’s choice is Eugene O’Neill’s 1920
Pulitzer Prize winning, “Beyond the Horizon,” the author’s first
full-length work.


A review of the first staging of “Beyond the Horizon” called the play “the
closest approach any native author has yet made to the great American
play.”  O’Neill’s epic gave birth to the play category of “new American
tragedy.”


Ironically, the playwright used a take-off on the romantic story line to
achieve his goal.  It was probably the formulaic romantic story line that
led an opening night reviewer to write, "There can be no question that it
is a work of uncommon merit and definite ability, distinguished by general
superiority from the great bulk of contemporaneous productions. However,
the play ‘is not quite a masterpiece.’”


The play centers on a slowly evolving portrait of the Mayo family.  Andrew
and Robert are bound by brotherly love, but are totally different.  One is
a pragmatist, the other a dreamer.   The brothers fall in love with the
same girl.  Both wind up sacrificing what they really want out of life in
order to do what they think may be better for the other, and, in the end,
both lose out.


“Beyond the Horizon” is a play about dreams.  Every character has clearly
etched desires.  The father, James, wants a bigger farm with his older son
accomplishing his vision.  Ruth yearns to have a husband.  Robert and Andy
have opposite dreams.  Andrew wants to accomplish his father’s goal.
Robert, a poet and reader, envisions himself living out his romantic dreams
of going “beyond the horizon,” going to “the far places of the world that
beckon alluringly.”


The script effectively walks the fine line between melodrama and
prescription romantic saga.  In lesser hands the plot probably would have
strayed from reality and into romantic fantasy.  But, fortunately, O’Neill
is too proficient a writer to allow for that.


The script follows the format of a three-act play, so popular in the early
to mid-twentieth century.  It makes for a long, over two-hour sit.


Ensemble’s production, under the direction of Celeste Consentino, develops
the playwright’s intentions.  The pacing is languid, maybe a little too
languid in places.  Tensions don’t always build to their climax. The acting
mainly stays on the surface, actors not digging deeply beneath the surface
level of the thoughts and feelings of their characters, a digging that
often unearths deep pain and emotional feelings that aids the performer to
illuminate the person they are portraying.


James Rankin generally gives a nice poetic dreamer quality to Robert.  His
closing scenes are properly wrought with pain and the letting go of any
hope for the life he dreamed he’d live.


Keith Stevens, as the hard working Andrew, develops a nice contrast to his
escapist brother.  Robert Hawkes clearly creates a rough, determined
father.


The technical aspects are unnerving.  Large electronic projections of
fields and a house interior visually overwhelm in the small Ensemble
venue.  The pictures of Mary, the young daughter, many times larger than an
actual child, with an overpowering voice, makes the youngster surreal.
That might have been fine for horror movie,  but this is a realistic play.


*Capsule judgment:  “Beyond The Horizon” is a Eugene O’Neill classic which
gets few stagings.  The Ensemble production, in general, allows us to
experience the beautiful writing of a master playwright. Ensemble is to be
praised for continuing in its task to help keep the classics alive by
producing this and other epic plays.*

“Beyond The Horizon” runs Fridays and Saturdays (8 PM) and Sundays (2 PM)
through May 18, 2013, at Ensemble Theatre, housed in the Coventry Building,
2843 Washington Blvd, Cleveland Heights.  For tickets call 216-321-2930 or
go online to http://www.ensemble-theatre.org

To read the views of other Cleveland area theatre reviewers go to:
clevelandtheaterreviews.com

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