The best thing about The Lion in Winter at Gorilla Theatre is Caroline Jett’s spectacular performance as Eleanor of Aquitaine.
I’ve seen Jett on local stages several times, but even so I was unprepared for her splendid work in James Goldman’s play. Jett’s Eleanor is clever, regal, coy, self-possessed, untrustworthy, funny, indomitable and in despair. She knows that her holiday visit to her husband’s castle will only be brief and that soon enough she’ll be placed in captivity again, but she doesn’t let this fact interfere with her royal dignity — or her wit. Even when her husband has bigger moments dramatically — and Robert Hooker plays Henry II with great, booming swagger — Jett’s Eleanor dominates our attention. Henry is all passion and power, but Eleanor is something much more complicated and affecting, a lioness testing the limits of her cage, a female Samson searching out what strength might be left to her. If acting were enough to make a play successful, Jett’s performance would make this one more than satisfying.
But it’s not, and the faults are all in James Goldman's 1966 script (basis for the celebrated 1968 film starring Katherine Hepburn and Peter O'Toole).
This article appears in Jan 20-26, 2011.