Kila Packett

Window dressing: Lolita Foster as Isabella and Carman Lacivita as Colonel Britton in "The Wonder!," by Susanna Centilivre.

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This must be the season of the woman - or the woman playwright.

Kings County Shakespeare Company and Flying Fig Theater are both presenting obscure plays by female playwrights. Both feature young ladies determined to defy a father or a brother, avoid a convent, and marry whom they please. Both take place in sunny and exotic cities (at least in the eyes of Englishmen). And both plays feature rogues who are bested - but not bedded by - good and true women.

’Wonder’ woman

"The Wonder!: A Woman Keeps a Secret," written by Susanna Centlivre in 1714, is based on the premise that it is the odd woman who can take charge of her own life and manipulate men so that she gets her own way. Indeed, this was probably true in the 18th century.

Today, in Western societies, it is more likely the odd woman who is dependent on her husband or father and submissive to their wills. And so, plays like "The Wonder!" have become period pieces that are only performed by ambitious, academic or feminist companies like Flying Fig Theater, which is currently presenting "The Wonder!" at Fort Greene’s South Oxford Space.

Director Michaela Goldhaber, a Fort Greene resident, has clearly done her homework on Centlivre and the drama of her time. The production is replete with robust sword fights, bawdy flirtation and ironic asides. Add to this Goldhaber’s casting of a racially diverse group of actors and actresses, and the unique qualities of this particular theater space - the beautifully restored, wood-paneled Great Room, with its recessed stage and large windows that are perfect for hasty and clandestine exits and entrances - and the production is nothing if not visually arresting.

One must not, however, let the physicality of the "The Wonder!" distract the mind from the intricate plotting of the play.

Isabella (Lolita Foster) is a young Portuguese noblewoman whose father, Don Lopez (the superb Roy Thomas), wants her to marry a wealthy old man whom she has never seen. Desperate to lead her own life, Isabella runs away to the home of her friend, Violante (Megan Garcia), a young lady with her own troubles, namely her father, Don Pedro (Collin Biddle), who wants Violante to enter a convent so he can get his hands on her inheritance. Now Violante has to keep Isabella hidden from two furious fathers - hers and her friend’s, not to mention her own suspicious suitor.

Not too surprisingly, Isabella has a brother, Don Felix (Sekou Campbell), who is in love with the convent-bound Violante, and Don Felix has a friend, Frederick (Kevin Reed), who is not so secretly in love with his sister, Isabella. The faithful friend, however, has stiff competition that comes from his own friend, Col. Britton (Carman Lacivita), a Scottish soldier returning from the war in Spain.

Naturally, everyone has a maid or a footman whose intrigues often either complicate or facilitate the exploits of their masters.

Although Centlivre seems to cherish the thought of women taking control of their own destiny, the only way she figures they can do this is by finding a good man and getting him to marry her. The women in "The Wonder!" don’t use their considerable intelligence to run businesses or contribute to the arts and sciences, but rather to outwit their fathers.

But what the heck. For us in the 21st century, "The Wonder!" is not so much social commentary as light entertainment - which was probably exactly what it was meant to be in the first place. And it’s far better to concentrate on the obvious talent of many of the actors than to nitpick on the tentative liberties taken by the playwright.

Campbell and Garcia form a skittish but faithful couple whose extravagant emotions are the source of much humor. LeeAnne Hutchison is perfect as Violante’s perky maid, Flora, and Kila Packett is surely a worthy match as Felix’s footman, Lissardo, who pursues her.

Lacivita and Gabriel Grilli as his Highlander footman are like a Scottish Abbot and Costello; their conversation often sounds like an incomprehensible "Who’s on First?" and gets the biggest laughs of the show.

Becky Lasky has dressed the cast in believable and colorful, if not necessarily historically accurate, costumes. But it would have been helpful if set designer Caitlin McCleery had come up with a bit more to help the audience figure out where the characters are and how much time has passed between scenes.

If "The Wonder!" disappoints as feminist propaganda, it certainly succeeds as lively entertainment. Go see it - and take your daughters.

Aphra Behn: pioneer

The women-helmed Kings County Shakespeare Company (KCSC) has proclaimed the theme of its 20th anniversary season to be "Enter the Actress," dedicating the season to celebrating milestones for women in classical theater.

One of the first of these milestones is the career of Aphra Behn, England’s first professional female playwright. Thus KCSC has opened the festival with Behn’s best known and most popular play, "The Rover" (1677), directed by Liz Shipman and performed by KCSC’s junior, non-Equity acting troupe, Thespis. The production is now onstage at the Founders Hall theater of St. Francis College, where KCSC is in residence.

Behn had several other careers in addition to playwriting, most notably that of a spy serving Charles II in Antwerp. One can only hope she was a better spy than playwright.

Behn lived and wrote during the English Restoration. It was a period known for licentiousness and frivolity, in drama marked by the comedies of manners written by the likes of William Congreve, whose comedies took a cynical, light-hearted look at the ways of the world.

In many aspects, "The Rover," with its intrigues, betrayals and constant allusions to sex and the battle between the sexes, is indeed representative of Restoration drama. But while a playwright like Congreve wrote carefully constructed comedies with scintillating dialogue, Behn relies mostly on the kind of "dirty talk" that led Alexander Pope to call her a loose woman who "fairly puts all characters to bed." It’s sort of like the difference between "Man of La Mancha" and "Grease."

What’s more, Behn’s plot is so complicated and her characters so numerous, it’s often difficult to figure out who’s who, what’s what, or why the audience should care.

For the most part, the play concerns the forbidden romance of Florinda (Brie Eley) a young noblewoman of Naples, and Belvile (Frank Smith) an English colonel whom her brother, Don Pedro (Achilles Vatrikas), deems an unworthy husband for his sister and an undesirable brother-in-law for himself. In contrast to the steadfast Belvile, Wilmore the Rover (Jon Fordham), is a rogue who, along with his band of merry-making friends, is forever on the prowl for a new woman who might succumb to his advances.

During what may be less than 24 hours at Carnivale (a time when men and women - whose identities are concealed by festive masks - freely ramble and romp in pursuit of not-quite-innocent fun), he manages to entice the famous courtesan Angelica Bianca (Tessa Martin), whom he "beds," and beguile the chaste Hellena (Sabrina Mess), whom he does not.

There’s lots of what the company calls "bad Errol Flynn" sword fighting. It’s hard to disagree with this description, but one cannot help but wonder why choreographer Lucie Chin didn’t do the audience a big favor by trying her hand at good Errol Flynn dueling.

There’s also a bit of couples (wink, wink) disappearing behind discreet curtains and plenty of groping in front of the curtains. All of which is meant to show that men only want sex and women only want money (if they are less than virtuous) and security (if they are more than mercenary).

If in Behn’s own time she was accused of indecency for her advocacy of equality between the sexes and her preoccupation with sex, KCSC’s characterization of Behn as a kind of proto-feminist is equally absurd. Just think - it’s the chaste, though playful, Hellena who gets her man and not the freewheeling Angelica Bianca.

Nor is the clumsy plotting and poorly developed characters of "The Rover" helped by the relative inexperience of the cast. who, with the notable exceptions of the saucy Mess and the salacious Fordham, sometimes seemed to have needed a few more days’ rehearsal before opening night.

"The Rover" may be an important historical piece, but it is surely a work of doubtful literary merit.

Flying Fig Theater’s production of "The Wonder!: A Woman Keeps a Secret" plays through June 30, Fridays, Saturdays and Mondays at 8 pm, and Sundays at 7 pm, at New York South Oxford Space, 138 South Oxford St. at Atlantic Avenue. Tickets are $15. There will be a panel discussion on playwright Susanna Centlivre on Sunday, June 22 at 4 pm; tickets $5. For tickets, call (212) 868-4444.

The Kings County Shakespeare Company’s production of "The Rover" plays through June 29, Mondays and Wednesdays through Saturdays at 8 pm, matinees on Saturday, June 21, and all three Sundays at 2 pm at Founders Hall theater, St. Francis College, 182 Remsen St. at Clinton Street. Tickets are $15, $7 seniors and students (not recommended for children under 12). For tickets, call Smarttix at (212) 868-4444 or visit www.smarttix.com.

©2003 Community Newspaper Group