Old Play New To Shakespeare Theatre Audiences

Cameron Watson, who directed the current production at the Shakespeare Theatre of New Jersey, likes to wander among the audience during previews to hear comments and complaints.

Two women sitting in the balcony at the first preview of "I Capture the Castle" told him that it was the first play they had seen at the Madison theater in which they had no idea what would happen next.

Although the play was written in the 1950s and performed throughout England in succeeding years, audiences here have the "real sense of [discovering] something that's been lost and buried," Watson said.

The play, which opened Dec.  1, runs through Jan. 2.

He said the play, which follows 14 characters as they fall in and out of love and pursue their business and artistic endeavors, is "really about family."

While the play does not take place at Christmastime, the themes of doing what is needed to ensure your family's survival and following your artistic dreams make it appropriate for this time of year, Watson said. The production runs through Jan. 2.

Watson directed the U.S. premiere of "I Capture the Castle" by Dodie Smith, who also wrote "The Hundred and One Dalmatians," in 2006 in Los Angeles.

He said he had not heard of the play and was not interested in directing it when an independent producer, who was impressed by "Our Very Own," a movie Watson wrote and directed, asked him to read the script.

After a few pages, he knew "this was special."

Smith wrote the play based on her first novel with the same name. "I Capture the Castle" continues to be a popular a novel with young British girls, Watson said, adding that it's not clear why it is little known in this country.

Smith wrote the novel while living in Doylestown, Pa., where she moved from England during World War II. It is set in the '30s in a run-down English castle rented by the Mortmain family. The family has very little income years after the patriarch gained fame as an author because he never was able to write a second book. During the play, an American family arrives after inheriting the castle and other property nearby.

The Los Angeles production was in a small theater, but "it just exploded" on word of mouth and good reviews, Watson said.

He then sent the script to Bonnie Monte, artistic director of the Shakespeare Theater, when he had acted in "A Midsummer Night's Dream" in 1997.

Three years later, she called and asked him to direct it during the current season.

Working on the larger stage on the Drew University campus allowed Watson to "fully realize" the play, which has a two-story set depicting two castle towers, the family's main living space and the daughters' small upstairs bedroom.

Watson said the longer rehearsal period here allowed the cast to dig deeper into the characters and they improvised parts of the book that are not in the play.

He prefers the play to the novel because Smith streamlined the story by setting all of the action in the Mortmains' kitchen area. "It's a precise version of the heart of the book," he said.

Rebecca Mozo, who plays the teen-age narrator, Cassandra Mortmain, is the only member of the L.A. cast who is in the current production.

Although Mozo—who was nominated for an L.A. theater Ovation Award for her performance in "I Capture the Castle"—lives in California, she grew up in Warren, and attended Mason Gross School of the Arts at Rutgers University.

The cast also includes Shakespeare Theatre veterans Matthew Bradford Sullivan, as  Cassandra's father, James; Nisi Sturgis, who plays Cassandra's sister, Rose, and appeared earlier this season in "Arms and the Man," and Pressly Coker, who plays a young man in unrequited love with Cassandra.

Watson gained fame in the role of Bart Fallmont in the television mini-series "Dynasty—The Reunion" and has appeared in a variety of TV shows, from "Cheers" and "Frasier" to "NYPD Blue" and "CSI: Miami."

While he still does the occasional acting job, he spends most of his time directing theater productions.

He also has written a children's movie based on the King Midas story and said he is in talks with a major studio about producing it. He hopes to get a green light early in the new year and to complete filming in 2011.