Figaro

By Ella House

Capital High theatre’s auditorium hummed with life. The dull murmur of people in the house was enough to hide the sound of actors and crew backstage, doing what they’ve been doing for weeks. People shuffled into their seats as the house lights flashed twice. After a minute of people taking their seats, the warm stage lights turned on. Zita Gravley (Suzanne) and Reese Sheldahl’s (Figaro) presence drew the audience into bewildered silence.

Figaro is nothing short of hilarious. The comedy, based off the opera by Beethoven, is about the show’s name sake, Figaro, a steward to the count, and his plot to steal back his wife from his Count. After receiving a gift from the count, his soon-to-be-wife Suzanne reveals the Count’s true intentions to steal her away from Figaro. After devising a “figaro-ian” scheme to trick the count and make him “thank him for it in the end” finding his parents and getting caught in Figaro’s own trap, all ends as a true farce should end everyone gets married to the right person and all is well.

However, Figaro is profoundly funny as much as it is profoundly telling of the times. Buried under clever theatre jokes and innuendos, Figaro effectively conveys the class struggles that exist to this day. With clever digs at the rich and the powerful, Figaro’s quips are quick and clever, and deeply relatable to theatre goers everywhere. Figaro proves that even the underdog can pack a punch, but that message would have been lost without its powerhouse cast of long-time theatre kids like Gravley and Sheldahl.

Actor Zita Gravley (Suzanne) has been doing theatre since 2nd grade at Grandstreet but was welcomed into the Capital High Theatre family when she was a Freshman. She started out watching her cousin act and ended up enjoying acting herself.

“(I like) Exploring different personalities and not being a psychopath. Because you can become a completely different person for an hour and then leave it behind and go not be a psychopath somewhere else,” she explains.

The play is clever. With word play, theatre specific jokes and breaking of the fourth wall, it wraps up what makes a farce funny in a bow. From a man masquerading as a woman to quick jokes that could be easy miss, Figaro is down right ridiculous from script to stage. However, the actors are what made the show as amazing as it was. The close cast and crew knew how to play off each other and ended up making the play an amazing comedy with delightful moments.

Figaro is unique in its script writing. The play itself masterfully combines the silly with the serious. However, its serious moments are all the more poignant. No moment is more prevalent and moving than Figaro’s monologue. Figaro discovers that his wife-to-be plans to meet with the suave, womanizer of a Count; he is unaware the whole meeting is a scheme to catch the count at cheating on his wife. The behemoth of a monologue, averaging about two minutes long, is performed by Sheldahl alone on stage. The clever monologue gives backstory into the steward’s life. The monologue is fun, but most of all it’s raw. Sheldahl’s portrait of a serious, enraged Figaro is as captivating as his clever upbeat character. With a harsh narrative on the rich and powerful, as well as love, the monologue perfectly captures what the show is about, the Figaros of the world showing the powerful they still have some bite.

Reese Sheldahl (Figaro) started at Capital High Theatre with 45 Minutes From Broadway as a Freshman. He’s come a long ways from an ensemble member to being the lead alongside Gravley in Figaro. Sheldahl has completely absorbed himself in theatre. He is now an officer in the Capital High Theatre Club and directed a show, Lock Down, alongside his co-actor and then co-director Seth Lang.

“It’s a family here, and it’s become one of the biggest things in my life that influence me,” Sheldahl said fondly.

Next year the Helena theatre department plans on producing a production of The Music Man as a crosstown musical. With a fantastic group of actors, the future productions will be just as enjoyable as this spring’s production of Figaro.