Old Play in Manhattan

Alice in Wonderland (adapted from Lewis Carroll by Eva Le Gallienne & Florida Friebus; produced by Rita Hassan & the American Repertory Theater) was one of the pleasant offerings--and possibly pleasant surprises--made by Eva Le Gallienne's old Civic Repertory Theater during the '30s. Now it emerges as perhaps the pleasantest offering of Co-Director Le Gallienne's struggling new American Repertory Theater. In a clever stage version that includes the best of Through the Looking Glass--that indeed begins with Alice stepping through the looking glass rather than down the rabbit hole--much of Lewis Carroll's frabjous, daydreaming keeps its mischievous logic and its magic lure.

No doubt, for many grownups, part of the fun lies in the almost immemorial familiarity of every scene, speech or stanza; in waiting for this line to pop out or wondering how that character will stand up. Compared to Alice on the stage, even Hamlet becomes an uncharted wilderness. But much of the fun lies in what is permanently funny--or what is gay, or outrageous, or queer.

There are weak spots, even occasional weak stretches; and perhaps the whole thing could have a more truly dreamlike oddness. But with the costumes and sets carefully and beautifully patterned on the Tenniel drawings, and with Richard Addinsell's generally agreeable music, this Alice is no mere theatrical makeshift, but genuine make-believe. Outstanding episodes: The Pool of Tears, the Trial Scene, and Tweedledum & Tweedledee (whose joint recital of The Walrus and the Carpenter is neatly acted out with marionettes). As Alice, Bambi Linn (Oklahoma!, Carousel) has a true childlike charm, a Tenniel look, and a big-eyed, brow-furrowed wonderment.

Banked with mock turtles, dodoes, lories, red and white queens, mad hatters, March hares and hookah-smoking caterpillars, she manages to make them as real as she is by making herself as unreal as they are. This is the art of fantasy.

Like the circus, Alice is something you can tell yourself the kids ought to see--but naturally they can't go alone.

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