lhfantasticks

Review of //The Fantasticks//

 * 1. What is the difference between major and minor characters? Who are the major characters in //The Fantasticks//? Who are the minor characters in //The Fantasticks//?**

The main characters in a story are the ones around whom the plot is based; they are the most important characters in a story. Minor character, on the other hand, are important to the plot and are necessary for the story to progress, but are not the most important characters. The major characters in //The Fantasticks// are Luisa and Matt, the children, and their fathers, Hucklebee and Bellomy. They are the central focus in this musical and without each of these characters, there would be no reason for the others to exist. The minor characters are The Mute, El Gallo, Mortimer, and Henry. These characters all make huge contributions to the story and, without them, the musical would suffer greatly, but they are not the main focus.


 * 2. Who is your favorite character and why? Or who played their part the best and why?**

My favorite character was The Mute. I thought that he was fabulous and was required to work harder to convey his thoughts and feelings to the audience without the medium of speech. He was the facilitator of the most important scenes in the musical and even acted as the audience in some scenes where his reactions and emotions were evident. I thought that Louisa played her role the best, however. Her face was exceedingly expressive and I was stunned by how well she played her character with the puppet. While Matt was a good actor, I felt that the puppet held him back and hindered him. Louisa, in contrast, was able to add another dimension to her character with the puppet. Her role was played through the movement that she gave her character, her own facial expression and her reactions to the puppet. She seemed to be playing both the character and an onlooker simultaneously and I am in awe of this ability.


 * 3. With which character did you sympathize the most and why?**

I sympathized most with The Mute. For the most part the characters were, for the lack of a better word, fantastic. Their extreme natures caused me to see them as only stage personae. The Mute, however, reacted as an audience member would; I believe his role is actually to bring the audience into the show and make them feel more included. In the sequence where he was “rebuilding the wall,” one could see how absurd he thought the idea was and the audience was able to project their own exacerbation over the course of events that had just happened on to him. He is present in every scene and plays the role of an active onlooker, which is exactly what this musical needed to ground it and make it tangible to an audience.


 * 4. Did you recognize anything that reminded you of yourself? What and how?**

This question is very similar to the previous question and I could answer it the same way, but, rather, I will talk about what I saw of myself reflected in Louisa. As most girls have at one point or another, I fell head-over-heels for a “bad boy” when I first started high school. The way she turned away from the nice guy whom had already won her heart and chased after a boy who obviously did not have her best interest in mind reminded me very much of a similar scenario in my own life. I agree with El Gallo’s view that your heart has to be broken at least once for you to appreciate the good relationships and well-meaning people in your life.


 * 5. How do the boy and girl change by the end of the play?**

Well, most evidently, the puppets disappear, which I believe symbolizes their emergence into maturity. By the end, they are no longer controlled by their fathers and their ignorance, but are capable of rational thought and wise decisions. Additionally, to begin with Louisa was a bit insane (as are most teenagers) but by the end of the musical she seems to have moved away from this insanity and can now think rationally. In the beginning, Matt played the role of the typical recent college graduate, feeling as though he had life by the collar and that he could accomplish anything in the “real world”. By the end, life has beat him down a bit and he has learned to appreciate what he has and may have learned ho he fits into the world.


 * 6. What does El Gallo mean when he says he will “remember the girl’s kiss”? How does he play his character?**

El Gallo obviously had not intention of staying with Louisa and immediately left her despite Matt’s pleas. This implies that he meant that he would remember the kiss due to the fact that he would not experience another one. The memory will serve as more of a trophy of his victorious deception than as the fond memory that Louisa would have.

He plays his role as a puppeteer; the evidence of this is clear in the scenes in which he stands on a higher level than the other characters and makes motions that “control” their motions. The other characters play right into his plan as he harshly prepares them for their lives ahead. With his asides, the audience is able to sympathize with him and see him as more than an evil antagonist. One cannot help but believe him when he says that all that he does is for the characters own good and, though the characters may only see him as an evil opponent, he truly intends to serve their best interests.


 * 7. How are the fathers different? What other teams of characters in film or television do they resemble? How do they play their roles?**

Matt’s father is of the opinion that children and vegetables should be raised with just enough nurturing to sustain them and that pruning, actual and metaphorical, is as important as any other aspect of growth. Louisa’s father emphasizes watering his plants and also gives his daughter anything that she wants. Hucklebee says that this will spoil the vegetables and children, but Bellomy only wants to give more. They are very good at showing their contrasting opinions while, at the same time, displaying a very close friendship that is only strained at times. Their parenting theories remind me of those of Marie and Frank from Everybody Loves Raymond. Marie resembles Bellomy in that she is constantly giving and helping her children and trying to make them the best that they can possibly be while Frank tries to teach them that the world is cruel and thinks that they should take care of themselves.


 * 8. Discuss Henry and Mortimer as characters and how well they played their roles. What was their function beyond comic relief? Compare theatrical histories and how they end up as a pair.**

Henry and Mortimer were fabulous! I was impressed by the way Mortimer downplayed his own acting abilities as they fit with the role. It was obvious to me, however, that he is actually a very good actor and is willing to play whatever role he is given to the best of his ability, even if that means restricting himself. Henry played the overly dramatic egotist phenomenally. He was just over the top enough to show that he is a comical character, but he is actually a very good actor and his exaggerated motions are obviously the product of much rehearsal and hard work. Aside from comic relief, these characters are vehicles by which great works of theater, such as Romeo and Juliet, can be incorporated in the musical in order to convey deeper messages than might otherwise be readily apparent. For instance, he use of Romeo and Juliet foreshadows the impending disaster and disillusionment that is soon to follow.

These two have obviously been members of theatrical groups before and have been left behind as stragglers. Perhaps their companies hired new actors and they are now “washed up.” Either way, their similar exits from professional theater have given them a basis upon which they have built camaraderie. They probably began their relationship on the basis of necessity, but have grown to depend on each other and enjoy one another’s company.