How Does Gogol Use Satire In Drama

Plainly speaking, satire is by far one of my personal favorite genres of a play or production. Satire is defined as, “the use of humor, irony, exaggeration, or ridicule to expose and criticize people's stupidity or vices, particularly in the context of contemporary politics and other topical issues.” Shakespeare was one of the best writers when it came to using satire in his plays. For example, Romeo and Juliet contains several satirical jokes and references at the romantic culture of Elizabethan England. Nevertheless, my love for the brilliance that is satire piqued my interest in a Russian Satire dubbed The Government Inspector, by Nikolai Gogol, preformed by the Classic Theatre Company. I was genuinely ecstatic at the prospect of seeing
Being set in Russia in the early 1830’s, I expected the acting to reflect the time period and setting. While the characters and actors where distinct and different from one another, their performance was less than believable. For example, all the characters are meant to be exaggerated and hilarious without trying. One such character, Anton Antonovich Skvoznik-Dmukhanovsky the town’s corrupt Governor is comically worrisome and frantic, which makes for some hilarious scenes. However, the actor’s execution of his character felt forced and fake. This notion fits well with the all actors as the director himself said, “All the characters don’t realize their exuberant behavior. Its just normal for them.” I disagreed with the director in this regard. I neither believed nor enjoyed any of the character performances. Furthermore, as an actor one strives to make their character believable to the audience and in this production they failed to do that very thing. On the other hand, they portrayed the satirical corruption and evil of government humorously and in a way I could understand. Nonetheless, the acting could have been more convincing and impactful but the actors were only one part of the
As mentioned previously The Government Inspector is set in Russia, hence the garb should reflect the place and time period. On the contrary, the costumes had a more modern spin to them with a hint of Russian asthenic. For example, the women of the play wore very modern colorful dresses that just didn’t seem to mix with the Russian background. The costumes were more personalized to the individual character to extenuate their personalities rather than being precise to the time period. As an audience member, I was taken aback by these costumes. They were very distracting to the story and I believe the costumes took away the actors impact on the performance. Regardless, the costuming did not assist the actor’s efforts to create a convincing story to the audience. If they had done more research into the clothes of that age and country, it would have possibly improved the actor’s presentation of the