Doubt

A new theater company. A powerful, award-winning play. A fine cast in good form. Strong direction. Those parts should add up to a successful evening of theater, and they do, in the debut of Dramatic License Productions, which opened "Doubt" in splendid style last night at the Kranzberg Theatre in Grand Center. It will run through Aug. 15.

Four fine St. Louis actors illuminate John Patrick Shanley’s play, which he calls "a parable," and there are more than a few lessons to be learned from the entire cast, which involves Jason Cannon as Father Brendan Flynn, Kim Furlow as Sister Aloysius Beauvier, Sarah Cannon as Sister James and Leah Stewart as Mrs. Muller.

It’s a simple story. Sister Aloysius simply cannot understand – and cannot stand, either – the young priest who teaches at the Catholic school in the Bronx where she is principal. The year is 1964, a picture of the recently assassinated John F. Kennedy hangs on a wall. The priest is young, and handsome, and he wins the students’ love. She’s old, a woman who entered the convent when her husband was killed during World War II (20 years earlier) and neither she nor her intellect have been outside its walls. She has absolutely no doubt that he is a bad influence, and her calling is to remove him, a task more easily described than accomplished.

Cannon is superb, never hitting a false note, whether he is delivering a sermon or trying to climb from the pit where Sister Aloysius is trying to bury him. Furlow has many splendid moments, but she is betrayed on a handful of occasions by an audience that laughs too much.

The lines may be funny, but Shanley doesn’t want laughter. He wants shock. Furlow errs occasionally by obviously expecting the laughter, but a key point in the play is that Sister Aloysius does not have a sense of humor. Every outrageous statement she makes is deadly serious. We in the audience must be appalled, and not cover our feelings with nervous laughter. Think about it.

Leah Stewart starts slowly, but rises to real power as she also delivers some shocking truths and defends them with brutal honesty. Sarah Cannon is young Sister James, an idealistic young nun/teacher who falls right into Sister Aloysius’s trap. Obviously, the older nun has done this before, and she needs an innocent to pull her chestnuts out of the fire. Cannon is just right as the innocent, but there are moments when her responses to Sister Aloysius are too much the little girl.

Cannon’s direction is spot-on, and Bryan Schulte designed the effective set.

It’s a fine debut for Dramatic License, which will move to a West County space for its 2010 season.

A Dramatic License production through Aug. 15 at the Kranzberg Black Box Theatre in Grand Center.

-Joe