Theatre Is Easy

Dillon
Slagle

March 18, 2014

The Queen’s Company’s all-female production of Aphra Behn’s Sir Patient Fancy showcases a restoration comedy in all its bawdy grandeur. Written in 1678, the play follows several pairs of lovers as they attempt to join together for a long awaited sexual encounter, matrimony, or in some cases both. Playing with revelation of information beautifully, only the audience can see what is actually happening, and who is who, as the characters struggle to surmount the challenges brought against them by fate or their own poor judgment. The situations are funny enough in themselves: Natalie Lebert’s performance of Sir Patient Fancy’s hypochondriacal illnesses often drew an ovation from the audience. Yet, it is the character’s thoughts and reactions that really get you rolling in the aisles. The private reactions of Lady Fancy, played masterfully by Tiffany Abercrombie, as her schemes are dashed or nearly discovered, may be the best part of the whole show. All the performers have a good grasp of the language, and are able to keep the show’s incredibly brisk pace.

Blog Critics

Jon
Sobel

March 17, 2014

Modern theater companies really ought to stage Restoration comedies more often. While almost every age has its Benny Hills and Tyler Perrys, nothing in English can top the best of the randy plays of the late 1600s for dirty antics and laugh-out-loud comedy. The language of the stage had evolved by that time from the days of Shakespeare, into an English easily recognizable and followable by modern ears. The best of the comedies, which typically dealt with the sexual escapades of the aristocracy, were full of puns and double-entendres that we, more than three centuries later, can get – and cleverness few of us can aspire to.

New York Theatre Review

Aaron
Grunfeld

March 19, 2014

Because each show by the Queens Company improves on the last one, it’s no surprise that Sir Patient Fancy is remarkably fun. This all-female troupe revives English comedies from Shakespeare’s era and after, and they have a knack for comic drama. Last season they produced a playful, love-drunk take on As You Like It; this season sees the company reunite for a less familiar play. Sir Patient Fancy is by Aphra Behn, England’s first professional female writer and an adventurer who dabbled in sex and espionage. Her plays and novels disclose a robust spirit, proving her to be a skilled dramatist of sturdy sexcapades that are still worth watching. Behn embraces decadence and dissembling, and her characters are motivated by desire—a surprise pleasure for audiences used to Shakespearean morality.

Andy
Webster

March 24, 2014

The Queen’s Company, the all-female downtown ensemble led by Rebecca Patterson, taps its inner swashbuckler (and farceur) with Sir Patient Fancy, a work by one of the rare female professional playwrights of the 17th century, Aphra Behn (1640-89). Little is known about Behn except that she was a spy for King Charles II at one point, and that her plays often possess a ribald flair. This one, presented at Wild Project in the East Village, certainly does. Sir Patient Fancy concerns three noblemen: Leander Fancy (Amy Driesler) seeks Lucretia Knowell (Antoinette Robinson); Lodwick Knowell (Sarah Hankins) courts Isabella Fancy (Sarah Joyce); and Charles Wittmore (Elisabeth Preston) is having an affair with the married Lady Fancy (Tiffany Abercrombie). But Lodwick’s mother, Lady Knowell (Julia Campanelli), appears to covet Leander, and Lucretia has been pledged by her mother, Lady Fancy, to the simpleton Sir Credulous Easy (Virginia Baeta). And then there is the troublesome presence of Lady Fancy’s husband, Sir Patient Fancy (Natalie Lebert), an imperious, blustery hypochondriac.

March 25, 2014