Theatre
Unoriginal Sin
Manoel Theatre

Everybody loves contemporary comedies of manners because we still find that they poke fun at society’s moral faux pas and David Tristram’s farcical Unoriginal Sin, produced by Mellow Drama last weekend was a typical combination of the most formulaic elements prescribed by the genre. I have watched other plays by Mr Tristram, one of which I thoroughly enjoyed, but this, I’m afraid, falls into that category where a rather weak script cannot quite carry the weight of the topics it attempts to discuss. True, it did have flashes of extremely witty quips, but the promise they set up was not quite fulfilled, despite the fact that the cast were all making a valiant effort to make the best of it.

Bill and Jenny, played by John Montanaro and Louiselle Vassallo, are going through a messy divorce – he’s a wealthy womaniser with the libido of an alpha stag in rutting season, while she is having an affair and is a patron of one of the most misunderstood organisations there are – the catwalk, whose economic success she is entirely committed to bolster. She has the perfect piece of evidence to use against him in her divorce settlement, when she takes a very graphic Polaroid of his latest conquest, and hires Miles, his best friend and lawyer, to represent her instead. Miles, played by Stefan Cherriet Busuttil, is led to believe that Bill is having an affair with his wife by Bill himself in order to shake him into realising that he is not giving his wife enough attention. This influences Miles in no small part, to work for Jenny out of spite. Enter Faye Paris’s young and impressionable Eve, the supposedly adopted daughter of Fr Tomlin, a Catholic parish priest in a cameo by Barry Calvert, who is interested in buying their overpriced cottage for her impending marriage with Jean-Pierre Agius’s Neville, a boring sap of a librarian. Bill finds himself falling predictably in love with Eve – the forbidden and improbable temptation, given her prim demeanour, which reveals, nonetheless a tantalisingly sexually curious streak. The usual comedy mayhem expected of such a piece ensues in an effortless, but rather pandering manner.

I enjoyed Ms Vassallo’s portrayal of Jenny for all the reasons that typified her characterisation of the social-climbing, gold-digging trophy wife whose love-hate interaction with her soon-to-be ex-husband Bill, was dynamic and reciprocated well by Mr Montanaro, who played the role of a loveable rake surprisingly comfortably. His pacing was equally good with Ms Paris, whose character was just on the right side of annoying in her saccharine portrayal of the naïve and impressionable Eve, which she handled endearingly. What I felt was rather lacking was an evenness in the comic timing between scenes as well as in multiple character scenes.

Mr Cherriet Busuttil’s Miles was meant to be a bit of a self-obsessed dandy with an over-the-top attitude. However, I felt that he did perhaps overdo it slightly and at times risked upstaging some of the other performers, although his stage presence is indisputably strong. I did, however enjoy the energy he brought to his character and this was counter-balanced by the intentionally bland and overly-calm performance given by Jean-Pierre Agius as the shy and accommodating Neville, whose lack of lines were nevertheless compensated for by some commendable facial expressions and comedic monosyllables.

Director Steve Casaletto made very sensible casting choices – the actors certainly made the most of the script which was, ironically, as unoriginal as its title. With a set which worked extremely well as a “model-home” interior, the setting could not be faulted and the performance appeared to have been positively received by the audience. Unoriginal Sin is a box-ticker and fulfilled its purpose of bagging laughs and putting smiles on people’s faces.