The Dog in the Manger, and: Tamar's Revenge, and: House of Desires (review)

The Royal Shakespeare Company celebrated the theatre of the Spanish Golden Age with productions of four comedias during its 2004 season. Three productions opened in the summer with a fourth, Pedro, the Pretender, opening later in September. Although translations of The Dog in the Manger,Tamar's Revenge, and House of Desires (alternately titled The House of Trials in my translation) were already published in English, each of the plays received a fresh translation created especially for the RSC.

Spanish Golden Age drama is rarely performed in English. This is partly due to negative evaluations of Spanish drama (such as Oscar Brockett's dismissal of Spanish Golden Age drama as too concerned with a narrow code of honor). Spanish drama may appear less appealing to English-speaking audiences due to stiff, awkward translations in the past (as in Roy Campbell's often anthologized translation of Life Is a Dream). In recent years, the British theatre has produced more lively and stageworthy translations of these Spanish classics, which should be used both in theatre history classes and in performance.

The RSC translations attempt to be both accurate and accessible. In all three plays, the jokes spoken by the graciosos were actually funny (as they rarely are in older translations of Golden Age plays). The servants employed British slang, which I occasionally did not understand, but generally the translations would work for American or British productions. I wished that some of the more poetic passages had been rendered more lyrically, but overall the translations successfully conveyed both the tone and the meaning of the original works.

The Dog in the Manger centers on Diana, a countess, who falls in love with her secretary Teodoro. She tries to repress her love, because his lower social status prohibits their marriage, but Teodoro's pursuit of Diana's lady-in-waiting Marcela ignites jealousy in Diana, who refuses to let Marcela marry Teodoro. Thus, Diana is the proverbial "dog in the manger" who prevents others from eating what she herself will not eat.

Rebecca Johnson played Diana's conflict between love and honor with honesty and humor. Her sudden mood shifts drove much of the action, which in this production played as farce. At one point in the second act, Joseph Millson, a handsome, engaging, and funny Teodoro, brought down the house when, in reaction to one of Diana's sudden mood swings, exclaimed to the audience, "I have no idea what's going on." The audience laughed, because they understood Diana's opposing motivations while the line also served as a self-reflexive comment on the action of the play.