Karen Zacarias

This work traces the last few years of the life of Emilie du Chatelet, the woman who put the squared in E=mc2. Because her life is inextricably linked with that of Voltaire, he is a prominent feature in the play. The playwright suffered from the sort of problem always present when writing about two famously intelligent and witty people: you have to be a similar wit to pull it off, unless you have enough of their own works to let them write the work themselves. This actor plainly lacked the requisite amount of wit, and managed to make her play sound like something Junior wrote to amuse the folks at the family reunion, the sort of thing that gets tons of polite applause and insincere effusive praise. The jokes wouldn't make anybody past the age of 15 laugh; the dialogue is clunky and stilted; the premise of the play is annoying and frustrating - it appears to come down on the side of the most important thing du Chatelet did in her life was being a mother! And that brings me to the modern sequences. All I can say about that is - no, I can't say anything about the modern sequences. They are too vapid and depressing to mention. Avoid it.… (meer)