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From the ever-antic pen of David Ives (Venus in Fur, The Liar) comes his latest laugh-fest, this time adapted entirely in hilarious rhyming verse from a comic masterpiece by Jean-François Regnard. Meet young Eraste. He has it all: good looks, a beautiful fiancée and a huge inheritance from an ancient uncle. There’s just one little problem: the uncle won’t die and has bequeathed his entire fortune to a distant relative. Oh, and did we mention the uncle also intends to marry Eraste’s fiancée? What’s a fine 18th-century fellow to do? What else but enlist the aid of his resourceful servant, ...Read More
From the ever-antic pen of David Ives (Venus in Fur, The Liar) comes his latest laugh-fest, this time adapted entirely in hilarious rhyming verse from a comic masterpiece by Jean-François Regnard. Meet young Eraste. He has it all: good looks, a beautiful fiancée and a huge inheritance from an ancient uncle. There’s just one little problem: the uncle won’t die and has bequeathed his entire fortune to a distant relative. Oh, and did we mention the uncle also intends to marry Eraste’s fiancée? What’s a fine 18th-century fellow to do? What else but enlist the aid of his resourceful servant, Crispin, who could “out-Figaro” Figaro.
A “translaptation” — according to Ives, who coined the word — is a translation with a heavy dose of adaptation. In The Heir Apparent, he explains, “the farce is turned up all the way to 11. And what could be more up-to-date than Regnard's characters’ almost feral obsession with money? The off-color jokes made me howl even while I marveled at his facility at rendering them in such graceful couplets. I needed only a single reading to know I had to take on the piece.”
Le Légataire Universel premiered at the Comédie Française in 1708. In 2011 — 303 years later — David Ives’ The Heir Apparent premiered at the Shakespeare Theatre Company in Washington D.C. In 2014, it opened at the Classic Stage Company, where it was the recipient of an Outer Critics Circle nomination for Outstanding New Off-Broadway Play. In his New York Times Critic’s Pick review, Charles Isherwood hailed Ives’ adaptation as “lavishly spiced with contemporary slang that springs from the prancing verse like little jack-in-the-boxes and never fails to delight.” The Wall Street Journal warned, “Prepare to laugh and laugh and laugh—and laugh!”
The Heir Apparent runs Thursdays, Fridays and Saturdays at 8 p.m. and Sundays at 2 p.m., June 19 through July 12. Two preview performances take place on Wednesday, June 17 and Thursday, June 18 at 8 p.m. Tickets are $46 on Thursdays and Fridays, and $48 on Saturdays and Sundays, except opening night (June 19), for which tickets are $54 and include a post-performance reception with the actors, and previews which are $34. International City Theatre is located in the Long Beach Performing Arts Center at 300 E. Ocean Blvd. in Long Beach, CA 90802. For reservations and information, call the ICT Box Office at 562-436-4610 or www.InternationalCityTheatre.org.
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