Theatreworks in Colorado to mount ‘Sense and Sensibility’ | Arts & Entertainment
It’s a timeless question: Is it best to follow our hearts or our heads?
Many have tried to answer the unanswerable question, including Jane Austen, whose 1811 novel, “Sense and Sensibility,” explores its nuances.
The story follows the three Dashwood sisters and their widowed mother after they’re forced to leave their family estate and move to a modest home on the property of a distant relative. Sensible sister Elinor and her more sensitive sister, Marianne, navigate their romantic lives, replete with all the butterflies and arrows of despair new love brings. And through it all they have each other, though their differing ways of approaching the world drives them apart before they come back together.
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Theatreworks will mount playwright Kate Hamill’s adaptation of the classic novel Friday through Dec. 22 at Ent Center for the Arts.
“Elinor is the sense and Marianne is the sensibility,” said director Caitlin Lowans. “In the beginning they have different ways of pursuing love. The sense sister is conscious of the external world and the impact of the external world on the family. The sensibility sister ignores the structures of society and the impact on loved ones. The action of the play is about those journeys and the journey back from them.”
When people hear the name Jane Austen, and this novel in particular, many immediately think it’s a story about romantic love. But that’s not the case, says Lowan, who’s directing her last show as artistic director of Theatreworks. She accepted a position as artistic director of the Ten Thousand Things theater company in Minneapolis, Minn., and will start in February.
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“The true love of Jane’s life was her sister, Cassandra,” Lowans said. “This story is focused on the love the two sisters have for each other. The loving journey of this play — sure, there’s romantic love — but really it’s about how the sisters misunderstand each other, grow apart, and grow back together more deeply over the course of the play.”
Austen had a wicked sense of humor, Lowans says, and Hamill’s adaptation preserves that humor through her script featuring seven actors: Elinor and Marianne and five others who take on multiple roles throughout the show, including those of love interests, close family, town gossips and even horses. For example, Colton Pratt, who recently starred as King Henry in Theatreworks’ “Henry IV & V,” will play both love interests of the sisters: awkward Edward and the overly charming Willoughby. There’s also one character, a nosy neighbor, who is played by all five actors at some point.
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“She’s got a very recognizable costume and thanks to the brilliance of the actors they’ve created a character that is very delicious,” Lowans said. “Getting to watch five different artists interpret her has been one of the biggest treats of the rehearsal room.”
Though Austen’s novels and Hamill’s play have a strong dose of humor, they also aren’t afraid to be deeply human. It’s impossible to call the play strictly a comedy or a drama.
“The thing about real life and Austen is that it’s both,” Lowans said. “Real hard things happen in the play and those hard things slam up against the silliest moments. That’s what this play does. Moments of deeply silly comedy and also a family struggling with loss and sisters unsure of whether they’ll get to be with the people they love. We oscillate back and forth between those two things that feels very true to how life works.”
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