By David Brunner
Staff Writer

The ending of the Purdue Experimental Theatre's latest production of George Bernard Shaw's "Candida" completely made up for the slow and confusing start. Director Dale Miller and his cast were able to harmonize the end of the play despite the cumbersome first two-thirds.

The play was also well balanced by its extravagant costumes and extensive set design that helped take up the slack where the script left off.

The fact that "Candida" is set in late 19th-century London brought obstacles to Miller and his crew. The fact that the play was set in the 1800s and in London created a rift between the audience and the cast that was not as observable in other productions like "Bus Stop," where the play was set in Kansas City, Mo., and in the middle of the 20th century.

The time period, cultural differences and accents — which were portrayed in a spectrum of success from the cast members — were not the only characteristics of the play that drew from its potential. The play's seven speaking roles — one less than "Bus Stop" - should have made the understanding of this show easier. This was not the case in the first third of the play when the elaborate costumes were the easiest and most entertaining thing to pay attention to. Of the seven roles, only four had become useful and essential to the script by the first intermission. In fact, the other three seemed to have little significance in the play. The character Burgess, played by Martin Swoverland, seemed to have come from another script as he constantly ran around, scared that his family and friends were going mad. The character of Maid Maria, played by Kathryn Bartholomew, had such a small part of the script that Bartholomew spent almost more time at curtain call than she did under the spotlight. This character was more reinforced by other speaking roles than she was on her own.

It seemed that the actors and the audience were becoming victims of Shaw's work until after the first intermission when a conceivable scenario began to form. Candida, played by Deborah Ouradnik, found that she was torn between two men. One of these was her arrogant husband, Morell, played by Trey Garner and the other was a sensitive young man, Marchbanks, played by Geoffrey Pard. Ouradnik and Garner both played similar roles in earlier productions — Ouradnik in "Arcadia" last spring and Garner in "Bus Stop" earlier this fall. Garner offered a wonderful performance with his developed English accent that he also used in "Bus Stop". This previous experience seemed to help both actors better understand the complexity of their characters.

Near the end of the play the plot became interesting as the answer to the question of which man Candida would choose became imminent. This tension was supplemented beautifully with the script and the actors' ability to comprehend the vitality of their roles. These roles contained not only the answer and the conclusion to the play, but the purpose and place of a man and a woman in a household, community and each other's lives. The climax to the story fell into the hands of Candida's character, and she chose the weaker of the two men as the one she would love, reinforcing the underlying theme of the play that a man may be master but he is nothing without the love of his wife.

This show is perfect for a date and well worth the slow and cumbersome start.