[In the following review, van Gelder offers an assessment of the Willow Cabin Theater Company's production of Lucrece, a play adapted from Shakespeare's poem The Rape of Lucrece, noting that the play's message is a timely one for modern society.]

Heartbreak but not tragedy is to be found in the Willow Cabin Theater Company's production of Lucrece. Earnest and interesting, this production revives the 1932 play adapted by Thornton Wilder from Le Viol de Lucrece by the French playwright Andre Obey, who in turn was inspired by Shakespeare's poem [The Rape of Lucrece].

In its timely way, Lucrece weighs not only the gravity of the rape of a faithful wife by her husband's associate but also the misuse of high power, the impact of gossip and rumor on the victim and the idea that such a crime violates not just one woman but the body politic as well.

For all the seriousness of its concerns and the echoes that its deeds and characters find in today's society, however, this handsome production at the Ohio Theater in SoHo never achieves the shattered emotions toward which it and the playwright so clearly aspire.

Part of the problem lies with Wilder, whose language falls short of the poetic insight, beauty, power and consistent rhythm necessary to the task. Part lies in the demanding role of Lucrece, performed in 1932 by Katharine Cornell. Linda Powell brings stature but insufficient grandeur to this daunting task, and most of the dramatic power of the play derives from its narrators, Maria Radman and, in particular, Larry Gleason. Made up as if masked, as in ancient Greece, they describe and comment on the action and lend the proceedings an appropriate tone of sober perception, understanding and sadness.

If this Lucrece fails to ascend to the highest art, it nevertheless presents a drama innately worthy of consideration, a tale that has echoed through the ages. It is the story of Lucrece, the faithful wife of the Roman lieutenant Collatine (John Bolger). As he is in the field with his colleagues Tarquin (David Paluck), heir to the throne, and Brutus (Terry Schappert), they recall the previous night, when they descended on Rome to check on their homes. Although some of the officers were surprised at what they saw, Collatine's wife was found among the women of their house, working. “The fairest ornament of all Rome,” says Brutus.

After a lighthearted evening, Tarquin (“possessed by evil desire,” the male narrator says) steals out of camp, rides to Rome and imposes on Lucrece's hospitality to spend the night beneath her roof. While the household sleeps, he makes his way to her room, knowing full well the consequences, and leaves her no choice but to submit to him, saying that if she resists he will have his way, kill her and kill a servant whom he will blame for the crime.

And so Lucrece is violated and left, as she says, with a pure heart in a desecrated body.

All that remains is for Collatine to receive sober tidings from Valerius, a household servant ably played by Robert Harte, and to hasten with Brutus to Rome, where crowds scenting scandal have gathered and the fate of the anguished Lucrece, already clad in black, is to play out.

Under the direction of Edward Berkeley, this is a swift-moving production, with a set by John Kasarda that makes graceful use of curving gauze curtains and apt music by Paola Balsamo Prestini.

If Lucrece does not scale the heights, it nonetheless possesses merit.