Tartuffe

Written by:
Moliere

Translated by:
Christopher Hampton

Opening: May 8, 1992

Closing: May 17, 1992

Number of performances: 7

Time:1672

Setting:
A room in the house of Monsieur Orgon, a rich merchant

Synopsis:
As the NY Journal-American comments: "The whole shebang is really a farce of morals: The villain is irretrievably rotten and most of the people in the household he has chosen to infest are either sickeningly noble or stupid or both…The sense of elegance and flamboyance is evident as the play proceeds in the deep and lofty setting…and the colorful costumes…This is the home of the wealthy Orgon, where Tartuffe—a fraud and a pious imposter—has insinuated himself. He succeeds magnificently in winning the respect and devotion of the head of the house and then tries to marry his daughter and seduce his wife and scrounge the deed to the property. He nearly gets away with it, but an emissary from King Louis XIV arrives in time to recover the property, free Monsieur Orgon, and haul Tartuffe off to the pokey." And so his duplicity is finally exposed and punished. But not before the author has mercilessly examined the evil which men can commit in the guise of religious fervor, and the dangers which imperil those who would believe only what they choose to believe despite a mountain of evidence to the contrary.