Vox Populi, Vox Dei

By T.E.K.

DON JUAN

by MOLIERE

Masters and servants share a paradoxical equality and intimacy in several works of Western literature and drama. Think of Lear and his Fool, Don Quixote and Sancho Panza and, in this rarely presented play of Moliere's, Don Juan and Sganarelle. The masters are in the grip of some consuming passion or obsession; the servants try to sober them up with an occasional cold splash of common sense.

In this treatment, the servant's dicta are generally recognized as the dry-witted, earthy folk wisdom of vox populi. What is more interesting, and not generally recognized, is that the servant also speaks to these particular masters with vox Dei. The servant tries to warn the master that if he persists in his extravagant behavior, be it passion or madness, he affronts not only the social but the cosmic order, and will incur the vengeful wrath of the gods. The servant dare not speak too freely lest he be cuffed or dismissed. The master pulls his rank and fails to heed. And thus these overweening master-heroes plunge to their doom.

Don Juan is a classic example, and the story, as Moliere tells it, is not substantially different from Mozart's Don Giovanni, though distinctly less glorious as a work of art. Don Juan is a great seducer, charmer, liar and baneful curse to his father (Bill Moor), but he is something of more disturbing grandeur than that. He is a rebel on the scale of Lucifer. He defies God by challenging the order of things, by being as great an amoralist as one presumes God to be a moralist. He scoffs at fidelity, truth and honor as the manacles of a slave mentality. In his brain, even more than in bed, this great libertine is the precursor of Nietzsche's imagined Superman. Since Bernard Shaw was enamored of the same theme, it is fitting that much of Don Juan reminds one of Shavian dialogue and disputation.

On the other hand, Shaw was not quite capable of creating a wise fool as captivatingly human as Sganarelle. John McMartin plays this role to droll perfection, both physically and psychologically. His face and his body operate on alternating currents as he is by turns appalled, amazed and fascinated by Don Juan's behavior. As the Don, Paul Hecht is the compleat cynic and as seductive as the hell he courts.

Don Juan, playing in tandem with The Great God Brown, marks a most auspicious return to the New York scene by the New Phoenix Company, and a goodly omen for serious drama done with high style.

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