The Smith College Department of Theater put on David Adjimi’s reimagining of “Marie Antoinette” in late October. This vibrant, witty show combined biting criticism of a flawed monarchy with a wrenching portrayal of the real people behind the crown.
Waiting for the show to begin, watching the many hopeful in-person waitlisters who didn’t have the benefit of a gratis press ticket, the atmosphere of the set design plunged me into the world of 18th century French aristocracy. Beads of glass hung suspended from the ceiling, surrounding a great chandelier lit up in the stage lighting. The floor was embellished with a convincing inlaid marble. And, hanging at the back of the stage was a drapery of cloth that shadowed over the actors and audience, a guillotine looming above the palace.
When the lights dimmed, the heroine whisked out in a breathtaking pink gown, long and luxurious with that classic 18th century side-hoop silhouette, with enormous ribbon roses on the back and a matching bejeweled pink hairpiece. While the costume could have been ridiculous, and certainly did speak to the absurd opulence depicted in the early parts of the show, the gown’s design was beautiful, tasteful and somehow classy. The ladies of the court donned these extravagant designs throughout the first act, each with a different, monochromatic color scheme and not one, but two pastoral shepherdess outfits, complete with a beribboned shepherd’s crook. As the show progressed, and the royal family fell farther and farther from grace, Marie’s costumes mellowed, her ribbons and lace coming off one by one until, at the end, she was left in a plain sackcloth of a dress.
So, the set design and costumes were fabulous, and the writing was excellent, but what made the show spectacular was Marie herself, played by Mayte Sarmiento ’26. Sarmiento was luminous in the leading role, interchangeably lending humor, mania and, most of all, a deep pathos to Marie that held the audience in rapture. She never lost her hold on the audience from the very beginning, inviting us to laugh and poke fun at a silly, naive girl in her jeweled castle, to the end, when she wrenched our hearts with the profound anguish of a woman subjected not just to the loss of her life, but, perhaps more profoundly, the loss of her family.
The supporting cast only added to the vibrant recreation of this well-known story. Most notable being Hannah Hafner ’26 portraying a sympathetically pathetic Louis XVI, Evie King ’27 a convincingly steamy love interest, and, perhaps the crowd favorite, Cece Stell ’28 playing, of all things, a sheep. The cast’s performances were wonderful in their own right and their chemistry undeniable.
It was all of these efforts combined that brought this unique portrayal of this old story to life. Sarmiento’s Marie was foul-mouthed, obstinate and, as the play reveals, fundamentally well-meaning. A victim of circumstance who, though she made mistakes within her own life, strove to improve herself and the characters around her. As the play progresses and we watch her inevitable decline, Marie develops into a new creature entirely, practically unrecognizable from the naive girl she was at the beginning. Time makes her a survivor. And as she changes, so do her relationships with the people around her. She finds a love for her husband, a mother’s care for her previously neglected child (played by Allie Alston ’28) and she finds herself drawn into the revolutionaries’ discourse of liberte, egalite, fraternite. And, at the end, Marie addresses the audience directly, daring us to see the person behind the myth, to form our own relationship with her life and her legacy.
Even the guillotine could not drive the memory of Marie Antoinette from the minds of the world. If anything, it cemented her place in history as an iconic figure of opulence, foolery, violence and victimhood. I left the show with the impression of Marie’s legacy held fast in my mind and, beyond that, the wrenching performance of Sarmiento, which, I assert, no audience member will be forgetting in a hurry.
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