“Be All You Can Be” promises the sign over a recruiting booth in Shrewsburg, England, September 1774. It is, of course, a trap to get gullible men to fight the French—or any other thing their nation and officers choose. The set’s a lively market in a village next to the water and a ship. Here Irishman author George Farquhar’s text will set up an edgy drama of love and war—but a comedy because its central couples end happily. Norman Holland, that great scholar of “The First Modern Comedies” in English, called Farquhar “the last and least of the great comic dramatists of the Restoration.” Even though his The Beaux Stratagem has been his most staged play in recent decades, American Players has found the one that has most significance today. And it rates with me just as high artistically as the plays I’ve seen by “the masters” Etherege, Wycherley, and Congreve. I may, of course, be influenced by American Players’ manifestation of what Hugh Hunt, expert on Restoration acting, has called those actors’ “basic training...(in) speech, singing, dancing, stance, gesture and walking.” Here, luckily, a bridge is crossed between Restoration mannerisms and modern style, much helped by American Players’ refusal to mic actors. Director William Brown has them shun both naturalistic and melodramatic methods and gets just the right blend of realistic and grand manners. The action opens as unscrupulous Sergeant Kite (strong Jefferson A. Russell), who has a wife in every port, flaunts the recruitment enticements to be made further by his two superiors. Captain Brazen is the morally worst (and Marcus Truschinski is right to find traces of a fop in his cowardice). He attracts, however, Emily Daly’s sneaky maid, Lucy, who plots to get him. The major Recruiting Officer, Nate Burger’s attractive and sexy Captain Plume, can boast of many affairs. He’s in real love, though he tries to shake it off, with Sylvia, because it seems possible throughout the play that he loves his freedom most. He’s a pal of Mr. Worthy (a woesome, lovesick Juan Rivera Lebron), who loves Melinda but has lost her by asking her (on Plume’s advice) to be his mistress because he did not think her rich enough for his wife. In the play’s modernity, the main action gets turned over to the women. Melinda, whose sophistication is well shown by Andrea San Miguel, comes into money and boasts of the power that goes with it. By being uppity, she falls out with Sylvia, who leaves her father Balance on a pretense and goes to Shrewsbury disguised as a man. (This is a juicy part historically played under Garrick’s direction and by Peg Wolfington, and Kelsey Brennant here adds herself to that glorious history.) Disguised Sylvia, after being sought as a recruit by both Recruiting Officers and also, after spending a night with a local lass who’s confused and confuses others about whether they’ve had an affair, wins the object of her affections, Plume. She also gets the blessings of her father Balance (Brian Mani, sensible) and makes friends again with Melinda. All after a series of events, including a sword fight and a wench about to have a baby. Good work by all the technical crew to make the time and place of the play as easy to grasp as any modern village inhabited by modern folk. Altogether, an excellent piece of work by all concerned, Farquhar not excepted.
