I went to see The Imaginary Invalid on Thursday night and watched the entire play. It was interestingly interpreted, and not at all what I expected. (Actually, on first hearing of the play, I thought it was going to be a modern interpretation of the Oscar Wilde play, The Importance of Being Ernest, because of the name, but even after that when it was just a play by Moliere...)

To be honest, about ten minutes in, my teeth were on edge. After the dancers pranced around in the audience for several minutes, and then Micah Buckley (Argan) spent several minutes performing a monologue in an extremely grating voice, between grotesque coughing noises. Near the end of his solo opening scene, I was practically twitching.

ENTER Rossanna Mercedes, stage left, with an even more over-the-top voice.
At first, I was like, oh brother, but then … they grew on me. Everyone was over-the-top, gaudily dressed, and sitting in neon-rooms, and had a booming and ridiculously accented voice, which, once I got over my initial irritation with, because part of the productions Narmy-charm.

While most of the productions laughs come from over-the-top antics, (Tara and Micah get into a sword-fight with a cane and umbrella as she wards off a spanking) and voices, I can easily see this play toned down and transposed onto a more subdued canvas: it does deal with themes of love; romantic love, faked love, and familial love.

The Imaginary Invalid utilized plenty of TV tropes, fake death, the wicked stepmother, true love and star crossed lovers, arranged marriage, ultimatums, the gold-digger new-model wife, the charming love interest winning the girl’s heart over the big dumb brute (a la Beauty and the Beast), among a ton of others. Most of the play’s charm came from the interpretation of these tropes, it’s giddy silliness covering up serious themes, and dancing “gypsies” and harlequin “paintings” mocking the situations, winking at the audience, letting us know that everyone is in on the joke.