By Courtney Coleman / Staff Writer
Suspense (Paul Ledesma / Staff Photographer)
By Courtney Coleman / Staff Writer
Riverside City College’s Theater Department has had a number of successes in the past. Their latest accomplishment, “The Crucible”, which played May 10-12, surprised audiences with an emotional yet entertaining performance.
The play was first written by Arthur Miller in 1952. The original play, with its passionate characters and its timelessly relevant concepts, soon became a classic.
Many performing arts groups have failed to do the classic justice. Luckily, RCC’s Theater Department doesn’t fall into that statistic.
For the most part the cast of RCC’s “The Crucible” did an excellent job. Some of the actors filling smaller roles were hard to hear in the beginning and some important dialogue was missed.
Aside from a slightly shaky start, the remainder of the play was engaging as the actors found their voice.
“They did a really great job,” said Gabe Silva who came to see the show with his friends, “I’d never heard of ‘The Crucible’ before. It was crazy!”
“The Crucible” being a play built on emotion meant the actors had to use all their skill to make the characters and situations believable.
The actors did exactly that. At times the emotions portrayed on stage were so raw that the story was almost too believable.
“Sometimes I got a little too in to it,” says Kelsey Clark, another viewer. “I had to keep reminding myself that it’s just a show.”
Jordan Maxwell, who played the lead role of John Proctor, especially put on an excellent performance. Proctor, seeming to be one of the few voices of reason amongst an assembly of characters, carries much of the plays emotions on his shoulders.
From fits of rage, tearful confessions and passionate speeches, Maxwell kept consistent in precision and zeal.
Some of the characters seemed too young to be playing the roles selected for them. It’s hard to turn the face of young college student in to a seasoned adult. Painted streaks of gray and lightly done make-up wasn’t enough for some actors to be convincing.
Jennifer Lawson, on the other hand, who played Rebecca Nurse, did a near professional job at depicting a rickety elderly woman.
Nurse, another voice of reason is weak in physical strength but full of heart. Lawson’s representation of Rebecca Nurse made the character real to the audience- a task not easy to do.
Ignoring the minor distractions of poor make-up and missed dialogue, the passion of the lead roles and determination of the full cast made Miller’s classic in the hands of RCC’s Theater Department, yet again, a triumph.
