At a social gathering in a posh 1930s country house, hosted by Freda and Robert Caplan, a chance remark begins to unravel the perception of reality and expose the nuance of “truth.”
Lamar University’s department of theatre & dance’s will present J.B. Priestley’s “Dangerous Corner,” April 11-14 in the Studio Theatre. The play has all the hallmarks of Priestley’s best works with a small group in a closed space, each finding that what they think they know is not always accurate.
“I think Priestley is very interested, in this play, is the truth and the whole truth, versus the half-truth versus facts, and are those things different?” director Sophia Watt said. “And is a normal human ever capable of fully articulating the full truth, and how destructive can half-truths be.”
The play begins with four women listening to “The Sleeping Dog,” a radio play that ends with a gunshot and a scream. Freda (Briana Cobos) and Betty (Juliana McManus) are married to Robert (Jordan Albert) and Gordon (Bailey Jenkins), who are directors of a publishing company. They are joined by Olwen (Kiera Howington), a friend of the women, and Maud Mockridge (Ren Hollier), one of the firm’s novelists. The conversation turns to the suicide of Robert Caplan’s brother, Martin, a year earlier.
Robert and Gordon join the women, along with Charles Stanton (Nic Lopez) who works at the firm. Freda offers Olwen a cigarette from a music box. Olwen comments that the box belonged to Martin. However, Freda insists Olwen could not have seen the box before as Martin didn’t own the box when Olwen last saw him. Olwen accepts her mistake, but Robert is not convinced. As he pushes and prods and plays amateur detective, secrets are revealed.
Watt said that as each character recounts the event of that day they find everyone has a different amount of information.
“Some of them contradict, and some of them have pieces of the truth that then make someone else’s truth impossible” she said. “It’s very fun.”
The play deals with class interactions and how people treat each other. Three of the characters are just completely born into privilege.
“The way they treat the other characters, and the way that they’re comfortable pulling rank and talking down is so interesting to me,” Watt said. “Then you have two characters that work in the firm. One of them has now made it to a director. He has a great monologue where he’s justifying some poor behavior, but his point is, you have no idea what it’s like to work your way up. You don’t know what that means. You don’t know what that experience was like. We’ve talked a lot about class in the play and wealth inequality. I think it underpins a lot of it.”
Jenkins describes Gordon as arguably the show’s most complicated character.
“He’s got the most complicated feelings about everybody going on in the room,” Jenkins said. “He starts a lot of things. If there was one more (thing), it would be irritable, irritating.
“He’s very privileged and knows that and those and even mentions that at one point, like, he acknowledges that fully and admits that he doesn’t like trying to do anything that is responsible.”
Howington said Olwen, like Stanton, is not from wealth like the others.
“She and Stanton both come from the same background,” Howington said. “They didn’t grow up with money or anything like that. They’ve worked themselves up. But when you put her in a situation where she has to protect herself, she will. But I don’t think she would go above and beyond to intentionally hurt someone or their feelings in any way.”
Howington said the play is about how things can be unraveled from a simple conversation, especially with the characters in the show, and their backgrounds and where they come from.
“It is so easy to get under each other’s skin and really just delve into things that shouldn’t or don’t necessarily need to be talked about in the way that they do,” she said.
Gordon’s attitude derives from a position of defending somebody’s truth and honor.
“But I think the play is about the perception of that truth, and how different ways people see it changes,” Jenkins said. “There’s a whole speech about how complicated truth is. I truly believe that the whole show is about whose truth is the most accurate to what actually happened.”
The idea that we cannot ever know the full truth of an event is a deeply resonant theme, Watt said.
“(It) does play with what would have happened if these characters never found this out?” Watt said. “There’s a fun device that plays with what would have happened if these characters have never known and could they have been happy with half a truth, and the ethics of that.”
Howington said she hopes audiences leave with the truth, whatever version of the truth that they believe in.
“In the end, there really isn’t one definite truth,” she said. “There’s so many different opinions, and feelings and emotions that all of these different characters feel. You can sympathize with almost every character in some way, because there was just there’s just a lot of information. Everyone has their opinion on everything throughout the entire show.”
Jenkins said he hopes no one leaves the theater with a definite answer.
“I think it leaves a lot for interpretation,” he said. “I mean, the ending alone, it’s literally written so you have to take your own way out. We’re not handing you your piece of pie; you have to cut your own. It’s up to the audience to take what they want out of it.”
Showtimes for are 7:30 p.m., April 11, 12, 13, and 2 p.m., April 14. General admission tickets are $15, $10 for seniors, and $7 for students with LU ID. For tickets, visit lamar.edu/lutdtix.
This story first ran in the April 7, 2024 Art of Living section of The Beaumont Enterprise.
English with a bit of Texas 