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Review: DANGEROUS LIAISONS at Kanata Theatre
Kanata Theatre opened its 56th season this week with Dangerous Liaisons, a steamy historical play set in pre-Revolutionary France, written by Christopher Hampton and directed here by Sarah Hegger. The play is based upon a novel by Pierre Choderlos de Laclos, entitled Les Liaisons Dangereuses, published in 1782. Some audience members may also recall the 1988 film adaptation, featuring an all-star cast, including Glen Close, John Malkovich, and Michelle Pfeiffer. In Hampton’s play, former lovers, La Marquise de Merteuil (Megan LeMarquand) and Le Vicomte de Valmont (Stavros Sakiadis), conspire to conquest, seduce, and even assault individuals they desire or want to use as pawns for revenge against their foes. La Marquise and Le Vicompte treat everyone around them as disposable playthings, without realizing that actions invariably have consequences. With its themes of morality, lust, betrayal, and vengeance, Dangerous Liaisons is unusual in that its primary characters are less sympathetic than its secondary players. The audience feels more compassion for the innocent and naïve Cecile Volanges (Ava Gustine, in her acting debut), the sincerely smitten Presidente de Tourvel (the talented Lindsey Keene), and the foppish Chevalier Danceny (Thomas Jestin) as they are each used, abused, and secretly mocked by their tormentors disguised as concerned friends.
