When a character in this version of Molière’s The Miser uses the phrase "pardon my French," we like to think of it as a wink and a nudge from Magruder, acknowledging the irreverence of his accessible new translation (from the French, dontcha know). Magruder's script updates the language of the play to modern vernacular,  but retains setting and circumstances. These are still Molière's classical characters; they just happen to talk like 21st-century folks.

Magruder gets that this play is modeled on the purely-for-laughs style of commedia dell'arte; unlike The Misanthrope, there’s not exactly an undercurrent of social commentary to be mined here. There's no attempt to show some human side of the skinflint Harpagon, a man who'd rather doom both his children to unhappiness than part with a dime. It's straight-up comedy, and that's nothing to be ashamed of.