It is the final decades of the 18th century in Germany, a period of the literary and social “Storm and Stress” movement. In the conflict between two sons of a Count for their father’s affections, power and wealth, the brothers claim corollary personal liberty to pursue their personal, social, and political aims.
Franz is cold, calculating, slyly criminal in his acts to falsely incriminate brother Karl, become the heir, and conquer lovely Amalia. (Brendan Ragan is rightly despicable but clever as Franz.) Rebellious and high minded, though melancholy, Karl is favored by his father and betrothed to Amalia (played by Brittany Proia beautifully).
Partly due to his idealism, partly because of Franz’s lies and schemes, Karl joins a gang of young robbers. As a kind of Robin Hood, Karl leads them to go against the rich who hurt the poor; the politically and morally corrupt, who divide society and work against freedom of speech and progressive action. At least, that’s what the text would have us believe.
In Klaus van den Berg’s adaptation of Schiller’s play, the theory of dramatic post modernism takes over. Theatrically, the script divides into phases of chaos, reorganization into patterns, and final re-amalgamation of old and new. The Conservatory’s presentation shifts accordingly, so that characters — mainly Karl - -change in fundamental perceptions and actions. Their rhetoric alters their very language (here, much in music). Symbols and their meaning change.
The major acting challenge faces Christopher Williams. He acquits himself well as Karl, especially undergoing a major radical change. It’s summed up in a long monologue that Williams pulls off even though it’s near the end of a production that tests audience endurance of its unnecessary length and intense perplexities.
Director David Kennedy has spoken of his interest in connecting Schiller’s young people with groups like the Baader-Meinhof gang. The robbers are, like them, on society’s fringe, extremist, and anti-authority and the moneyed. If they are terrorists, of course, so is Franz. (His nearest equal here is Zak Wilson’s powerful killer-outlaw Schweizer.) But is any of them except Karl really a good guy? (There’s effective pianist Sarah Brown who steps out as a Pastor for religious commentary but it’s never clear if she’s earlier one of the outlaws.)
Granted that an acting conservatory’s purpose is to give actors a wide-ranging experience, what sense does it make to take an 18th century German play that stressed romanticism and almost began melodrama and turn it into a postmodern experiment with a synchronicity in differing periods, scene design, and acting styles? (Very little of the appropriate style is employed in the present instance.)
Both set and lighting continually draw attention to themselves, detracting from the story. (For example, a patterned rug under everything from forest ground to manor?) Projections to one side, however, do make clear words that are sung, since the singing robbers rarely do.
Except for the gang’s mod outfits, costumes range from the Count’s period suit (on a stilted Jesse Dorman, who bravely endures nudity later on a plastic lawn chair perched atop a backdrop) and an unshod Amalia’s filmy gown to a hoodie on Karl. That’s apparently supposed for a while to obscure his identity (yes sure, with his visible face being the only black one on stage).
How to sum up tersely the difference between Schiller’s The Robbers and what’s done by FSU/Asolo Conservatory? Well, consider that Verdi based an opera on the former. The van den Berg-Kennedy-Conservatory thing seems to have taken the musical version of Spring Awakening as inspiration. But actually little about it is inspired.
