Arielle Yoder

Bedlam’s 2014 production of "Sense and Sensibility," adapted by Kate Hamil from the novel by Jane Austen, and directed by Eric Tucker, set the bar so high for cleverness, originality and wit that we have come to expect this level of expectation from all of their future offerings. Unfortunately, their stage version of Austen’s last novel "Persuasion," a tale of mature love and second chances by first time playwright Sarah Rose Kearns, does not work as well. Among the problems are so much doubling and tripling that it becomes difficult to keep the characters separate and a lack of humor and irony that was inherent in the original material. Tucker seems to have forgotten that this should be a comedy of manners. [more]