BRATTLEBORO — In 1995, Jodi Clark took a theater trip to London as a student at Marlboro College, and there she saw a performance of Tom Stoppard's intellectual comedy of manners, Arcadia.
“I loved it,” Clark says, recalling that what struck her about the show “was the way the play could cover many complex intellectual thoughts and family issues in a simple, clear fashion. I always wanted to see what I could bring to this drama of ideas.”
Clark finally gets her chance as she directs the new production of Stoppard's show for Vermont Theatre Company (VTC) with a cast that includes Jessica Gelter, Adrienne Major, Francis Hauert, Sophie Gorjance, Jay Gelter, Veda Crewe, Robert Wellington, Brandon Batham, Ian Hefele, Burt Tepfer, Ian Mahoney, and Aja Selbach.
First performed at the Lyttelton Theatre, Royal National Theatre in London in 1993, Arcadia received the Olivier and Evening Standard awards for best play.
The first U.S. production, which opened in New York in 1995, earned the New York Drama Critics' Circle Award and was nominated for the 1995 Tony Award for best play.
English scholar John Fleming contends that it has been cited by many critics as the finest play from one of the most significant contemporary playwrights in the English language.
Arcadia is set in an English country estate called Sidley Park. As the play's Wikipedia page describes it, the time “shifts back and forth between 1809-12 and the present day (1993 in the original production) as the activities of two modern scholars and the house's current residents are juxtaposed with the lives of those who lived there 180 years earlier.”
However, Clark wants to assure prospective audiences that “Stoppard moves the action between the two periods seamlessly.”
In a VTC news release, she said the play features “vivacious characters, snappy dialogue, and seamless scene changes between these two time periods [that] invite the audience to explore family drama, quantum physics, complex mathematics, landscape gardening, and the larger question of: 'What's it all about, anyway?'”
“It is a complex show, but it is easy to follow,” Clark adds.
Some of the intricacies of the complicated plot can be seen as the play is described on VTC website: “In 1809, Thomasina Coverly, the daughter of the Sidley Park, is a precocious teenager with ideas about mathematics well ahead of her time. She studies with her tutor Septimus Hodge, a friend of Lord Byron who is an unseen guest in the house.
“In the present, a writer and an academic converge on the house: Hannah Jarvis, the writer, is investigating a hermit who once lived on the grounds; Bernard Nightingale, a professor of literature, is investigating a mysterious chapter in the life of Byron.
“As their investigations unfold, helped by Valentine Coverly, a post-graduate student in mathematical biology, the truth about what happened in Thomasina's lifetime is gradually revealed.”
Clark says, “Arcadia is very witty, and there are plenty of references for academic geeks who want to find them. It covers the spectrum of liberal arts, but I think the show is interesting in that it also deals with scientific and mathematics ideas which are much less often discussed in theater.”
Yet, as in any genuine comedy of manners, the play is also about who's sleeping with whom.
“It's where sex meets science,” says Clark with a laugh. “The very opening line of the play sets the stage for everything that follows as Thomasina asks her tutor, 'Septimus, what is carnal embrace?' I think that is one of the best opening lines ever written for a play.”
Clark has found it a joy revisiting this show. The VTC revival began with a private reading of Arcadia that Clark had arranged with some of her friends.
“A group of us get together now and then and read plays aloud, just to get into the language of some of our favorite works,” she says. “Our reading of Arcadia inspired me to want to put on a staged production of Stoppard's work. So when VTC producer Jessica Gelter asked me if I would consider directing again, I said, 'Yes: Arcadia.' She replied, 'Great, I love that play.'
“So here I am bringing this wonderful play for the first time to Brattleboro. I can't believe that it has never been done in the area before.”
Clark is a teacher at New England Youth Theatre and director of housing and residential life at Marlboro College. A graduate of Marlboro with dual majors in theater arts and anthropology, she co-founded the Vermont Renaissance Festival, which thrived for six years beginning in 2002.
In 2003, she directed a production of VTC Shakespeare in the Park of Twelfth Night, her “all-time favorite play.” She was also the site director for VTC's Henry V in 2013.
“My main experience is directing short pieces and theater improvisation,” Clark says. She feels that her experience working in improvisation has been a vital resource for her and influence on how she has directed Arcadia.
“I am relying on what our ensemble brings to the piece. I did not come in with a rigid set vision of the work. I want to play off of what each and every actor in the show has to bring to the production,” Clark says. “This flexibility is something I learned through improvisational theater.”
Clark believes such an approach was made easy because she has such a fantastic cast.
“VTC held open auditions through which we cast most roles,” she says. “But we did seek out a few people who we believed would be great for certain parts.”
But Clark wants to stress that Arcadia “is a true ensemble work, where every person in the production is important. We even have one character who has no speaking lines. When he was not able to make one rehearsal, believe it or not, we all felt the loss of his presence. It's that kind of play.”
Attempting to sum up what people are going to see in this “amazing” piece of theater, Clark has a simple explanation.
“The play is about the duality and what is between what we know and what we ignore,” she says. “Arcadia sits in the liminal space between those two concepts, and the audience has to figure things out for themselves. We never know quite what is definite.”
This type of play might challenge some who, like many Americans, don't like uncertainty.
“For instance, I have heard people complaining about the difficulty of teaching middle-school kids because of their lack of certainly about the world,” Clark says. “However, I find those students amazing. Just as their bodies are changing, they are always discovering new ideas and new ways to deal with a complex world. For them, all play of ideas is something worth exploring.
“In an odd way, I think Arcadia is a lot like a middle-schooler.”