Oh, Lady Chiltern— you are so much more than what you appear to be…
As an actor, I’ve been incredibly fortunate to play some amazing characters over the years, but every once in a while, a role comes along that is not just a great character, but a fascinating challenge. Lady Gertrude Chiltern in Oscar Wilde’s An Ideal Husband (Oct. 8–24, 2010) is one of those roles.
Right now my character work feels like an archeological dig—each day I make new discoveries that reveal a bit more of who she is as a whole. One of the exciting challenges of Lady Chiltern is that on first review, she seems quite one dimensional, one might even say boring. I would imagine there have been many productions in which she is played as nothing more than a pretty ornament, a woman whose written words are what she actually thinks and means. I am here to tell you she is anything but. She is terrifically complex—interesting subtext, rich history, underlying motivations—an actor’s dream.