Credit the directors of two on-going productions for making them sparkle and delight. They are Ted Pappas at Pittsburgh Public Theater and City Theatreӳ Tracy Brigden. Pappas has come up with a jolly, fresh version of Oscar Wildeӳ Ԕhe Importance of Being Earnest,Ԡand Brigden has done all kinds of good things in the world-premiering Ԉearts are Wild,Ԡby George Griggs and Darrah Cloud.

Generally, when you attend performances, you probably donӴ think often about directors. After all, you canӴ see them. You see actors. And normally, you donӴ think about how the directors were involved in those actorsҠinterpretations.

You are probably already aware, though, that how actors play actually comes through the directorӳ wishes. Actually, only the cast and other people backstage know for certain what the director has done and what the performers themselves have invented. Quite often, the interpretations turn out to be collaborative. That works best when the directorsҠand actorsҠconceptions match, causing the overall style to come together in one memorable result.

In both shows, we donӴ need to know who did what, but we must credit the directors for how everything turns out.

Pappas had the bigger challenge. He took on a famed script that has been heard, seen and admired repeatedly for 110 years. Sure, audiences might want to experience it more than once. Itӳ a classic. As with works by Shakespeare, Shaw and Sondheim, all playwrights whose words are as important as the context, re-visits are always justified. But each visit contains expectations.

In the case of Wildeӳ play, audiences are used to emphasize style and form, given that the play itself sends up a culture in which style and form themselves get excessive attention. Many productions of Ԕhe Importance of Being EarnestԠresemble verbal cricket matches, where players continually score points by expertly delivering non-stop aphorisms, comments and clever observations, as if that is what the whole thing is about.

Clearly, surface behavior and pretense abounds everywhere in the play. And itӳ easy to realize that Wilde was lampooning that aspect of English life. Pappas does not attempt to point up the satirical elements. He neednӴ. He has the text played for itself: a lively, ingratiating comedy, rather than a comedy of manners, about manners. In fact, you may see and hear things in the dialogue you hadnӴ noticed before. Pappas has his actors play everything, much like real people. In this case, the brittle dialogue is delivered as if the characters canӴ help saying what they feel and think, and, if they speak fluently and well, it comes from being upper class.