In 2025, the scandal at the center of ‘Mrs. Warren's Profession' lands differently
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Within the sterile boardroom environment, we meet Vivie Warren (Luz Lopez), a no-nonsense, independent young woman fresh out of university, who prefers actuarial accounting to concerts and museums. Now that Vivie has graduated from the best schools money can buy and is of marriageable age, her mother Kitty Warren (Melinda Lopez), who kept her distance and the nature of her business a secret, decides it's time for a closer mother-daughter relationship.
While condemning a society that condones poverty while denying economic opportunity and flouting a double standard for women, the true heartbreak within 'Mrs. Warren's Profession' comes from the fracturing mother-daughter relationship at its heart. It's a breakdown spurred by their conflicting views on how to earn a living without 'wearing out your health and appearance for other people's profit.'
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The play's emotional strength emerges from the sparks that fly between these two ambitious, independent women and the gap between the assumptions and expectations parents and children often have for themselves and each other. When Vivie learns that the money that bought her education was earned through prostitution, she expresses shock and moral outrage. Her mother's impassioned defense is based on the choices available to women. Vivie is won over, until she learns her mother continues to operate her profitable network of brothels, at which point she disowns her mother, determined to make her way in the world without her.
Nael Nacer and Wesley Savick.
Nile Scott Studios
Four men orbit this mother/daughter sparring match, representing aspects of the transactional world these women must navigate. They include Kitty's friend and confidante Praed (a dapper and dashing Nael Nacer), who makes a case for the artistic life; Sir George Crofts (an appropriately slimy Barlow Adamson), Kitty's business partner, for whom everything is a business deal, including an offer of marriage to Vivie; Frank Gardner (Evan Taylor), a shallow young bounder and Vivie's love interest, who sees her as his meal ticket; and Reverend Samuel Gardner (Wesley Savick), Frank's father and one of Kitty's former clients, who hides his profligate past behind the sanctimony of the church.
Tucker earned an award-winning reputation for visceral co-productions between his New York-based theater company Bedlam and Central Square Theater, including 'St. Joan,' 'Twelfth Night,' 'What You Will,' '
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While the actors do clamber through an open window and sprawl around on the conference table, Tucker's approach tends to obscure, rather than reveal the essence of this play. That table also creates an uncomfortable distance between the characters, so that we never get close enough to see the cracks beneath Kitty's veneer of a successful businesswoman, or get past Vivie's arrogance.
Each member of this company has moments when they shine, although oddly, it's the men who stand out – Nacer's suave and loyal friend; Adamson's rage at having his business deal rejected; Taylor's gold-digging eye on whoever can cover his bills; and Savick's blundering reverend, undone by the knowledge that Vivie may or may not be his daughter. But these singular moments never quite gel, and this production moves in fits and starts rather than the dynamic, fast-paced approach Tucker is known for.
While it's true Shaw was eager to poke society in the eye with his strident messages – 'Mrs. Warren's Profession' was published as one of his trio of 'Plays Unpleasant' – if we don't have the opportunity to feel the tug of conflicting allegiances to this mother and daughter, we don't see the emotional price these women must pay, and we're left only with Shaw's polemic.
MRS. WARREN'S PROFESSION
Play by George Bernard Shaw, directed by Eric Tucker, Bedlam, presented by Central Square Theatre through June 29. Tickets: $27-$103. 617-576-9278 x1,
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