Kings of War_Shakespeare in Dutch at the BAM Opera House

Kings of War is my second Shakespearean mash-up by Ivo van Hove (who directed Toneelgroep Amsterdam in performance of the adaptation by Bart van den Eynde and Peter van Kraaij).  The first (Roman Tragedies in 2012:   http://mollyismusing.blogspot.com/2012/11/friends-romans-dutch.html ) was longer, truer, better.  This outing is more particularly edited, not unsuitable for the U.S. election season.  In this production, van Hove and his cohorts for this translation by Rob Klinkenberg “adapted” Shakespeare’s Henry V, Henry VI Parts 1, 2 (not so much) and 3, and Richard III into one evening about kings and family feuds and wars and just plain murder.  Or was it?

The first two hours and twenty minutes of the evening were engaging, imaginative, clever, even funny.  The main events (political) of Henry V (“H5”) were covered, then on to Henry VI (“H6”) part 1, sliding over part 2, then clarifying the raison d’être for Richard III (“R3”) in part 3 of H6.  We fell from some highflying places to a very poor R3 for the second half of the production, so bad I catnapped during the last 20 minutes or so and didn’t miss a thing.  What happened? Why were van Hove, van den Eynde and van Kraaij able to, according to their own themes, comprehensibly condense four plays into less than 2 ½ hours, and make a hash-up in under two hours of the last one. 

For the first half, the setting was modern, easy to rearrange, and augmented with continuous video and supertitles showing us what was happening offstage. In Shakespeare, offstage usually means violence, and sometimes it does in Kings of War.  We’d watch backstage action on video until those participants entered the playing area.  At one point, what we saw were lots of sheep.  (They were not really backstage.)  The music of the first half was brass (by “Blindman”: Konstantin Koev, Charlotte van Passen, Daniel Quiles Cascant, and Daniel Ruibal Ortigueira), very exciting and fitting, especially with the inclusion of the marvelous contratenor Steve Dugardin. 

Each king was introduced on a red patterned carpet rolled onto the stage.  We have already seen the procession, of course, on the video.  The new king, Cardinals, right-hand men, queens, mothers and the like, all those people who have or wish to have the power behind the throne, would walk in step behind him (each him) as he walks to his coronation.  It’s a nifty set up, making it perfectly clear whose reign it is, with the King’s name flashed on the supertitle just to make sure we all knew what’s what.

The Coronation of Henry V (Photo by Jan Versweyveld)

Shakespeare generally puts the real violence offstage, therefore it appeared on video (by Tal Yardin) in this production.  Some of it was rather harrowing, and York’s examination of Uncle Gloucester’s offstage corpse in H6 was ghastly and effective.  Van Hove and his colleagues seemed most interested in the political machinations of the kings’ courts, courtiers, advisers, wives, so it was confusing but delightful that he retained the wooing scene between King Henry and Katharina toward the end of H5. 

There were some interesting and well-articulated performances in multiple roles by

·         Eelco Smits as Grey in H5 and the king himself in Henry VI

·         Leon Voorberg as Charles VI of France in H5, Warwick and later Stanley

·         Aus Greidanus Jr. as Gloucester, the regent for Henry VI, and later as Buckingham in R3, doing nice creepy work in the latter

·         Bart Slegers as the Chief of Staff in H5, York in H6 and later Edward IV (however briefly) in R3

·         Hélène Devos was adorable as Katharina in H5, with interesting choices (hers, van Hove’s?) as Lady Anne in R3

·         Robert de Hoog was excellent as a whiny Dauphin in H5, as the manipulative snake oil salesman Suffolk in H6, and charmingly broken as Clarence in R3.

But the best, the star of the evening, was Chris Nietvelt.  I’d seen her as Cleopatra (among others) in the Roman Tragedies, and here she played three roles:  Montjoy, the French courier in H5, then Leonora, foolish and self-destructive wife to Gloucester in H6, and finally Elizabeth, wife then widow to Edward IV, mother to the two princes murdered in the Tower and to young Elizabeth, wanted by Richard for his third wife (lest you worry, eventually to marry Richmond, Henry VII).  Ms. Nietvelt continues her fine characterizations and truthful performances that I learned to expect from her the last time I sat through many hours of Shakespeare in Dutch.

King Henry VI and Queen Margareta

There were some rather dull performances in single roles:  Marieke Heebink as the Duchess of York in R3, when she was as shallow as her theatrical son: Hans Kesting as Richard III.  Also far from stellar and merely scary was Janni Gosling as Margareta, queen then widow of Henry VI, lover of Suffolk, and theatrically Johnny-one-note from the moment we met her.

While I’m naming names, design and lighting by Jan Versweyveld, music by Eric Sleichim (yay first half, boo second half); costumes by An D’Huys.

In the second half, the set looked like the lobby of a middle class hotel. We saw that what had been the musicians’ gallery in the first half was populated with a “disc jockey” with no discs, just a machine to control the electronic sound, which produced irritating noise.  But then, most of the second half was annoying. 

Hans Kesting enters as Richard with a birthmark on his face and a limp.  His clothes are ill-tailored so he seems to be more physically inhibited than he is.  Richard was drawn to a full length mirror onstage, and kept returning to it.  Between that and the video filming him looking at himself, I had double vision with nausea.  Halfway through, to top it off, for no reason at all, Richard takes off his clothes center stage to change into his not much different costume for his coronation.  It took much longer than it deserved.  There could have been ten minutes cut off the playing time.  Surely there were other places to edit as well.

From a firm start with the Henry plays, the evening devolved to an uninspired R3. Kings of War, while shorter than the excellent Roman Tragedies that led us to this adventure, did not live up to that 2012 production 

This company uses the same designers and videographers and some of the same actors.  Interestingly, one of the flaws of this modern styling and the microphones and the television and the video is the same problem the Roman Tragedies had in the same BAM Opera House back in 2012: that I often could not tell who on the stage was speaking (particularly when two of the younger male actors looked rather similar to one another).  The miking of actors must be compensated for in the staging so we don’t wonder who’s speaking, what with all those sounds coming from the same place.  I also noted that the first two plays of the Roman Tragedies (Coriolanus and Julius Caesar) were well edited and “mashed” but that the last play, Antony & Cleopatra, like the last play in Kings of War, Richard III, lasted too long, as if the editors got tired and just said, this will have to do. 

In any case, I’m glad I experienced this production, flaws and all, and will give the next Shakespearean mash-up from Toneelgroep Amsterdam a try.

~ Molly Matera, signing off to re-read Coriolanus to figure out how much the Red Bull Theater production cut.

Pride and Petulance: A Lesser-Known Shakespeare Play on War and Women

It was a perfect summer evening at the Delacorte Theatre in Central Park. Hot but not stifling.  Clear, with enough of a breeze to keep most of the bugs at bay.  And a brilliant production on the stage for about three hours.

An infrequently produced play, Troilus & Cressida is set in Troy (a.k.a. Phrygia) when the war between Troy and the Greeks, ostensibly over Helen of Troy, has been going on for seven years.  This seems to be symbolized by the debris surrounding the set on its lower level, trash bags and plastic chairs separating the audience from the stage.

Calchas, a minor Trojan priest, allegedly foresees the fall of Troy and moves into the Greek invading camp.  His daughter Cressida he leaves to the care of his brother, Pandarus, remaining in Troy.  It seems the Trojans do not hold Calchas’ daughter responsible for her father’s surely treasonous actions, and Troy’s youngest prince, Troilus, falls for her.  The "romance” of the play is orchestrated by Cressida’s uncle Pandarus. 

John Glover, my favorite Pandarus to date, opens the play as Prologue, and closes the tale of lust, greed, and violence with sly wit.

 

Andrew Burnap as Troilus, John Glover as Pandarus, and Ismenia Mendes as Cressida. (Photo Credit Joan Marcus, NYT)

The major players you’ll have heard of.  Among the Greeks are 

• Agamemnon, the great general played with confident strength by John Douglas Thompson
• His brother Menelaus, cuckolded husband of Helen, an appropriately mealy-mouthed performance by Forrest Malloy (who also plays a creepy Calchas)
• Nestor, the old soldier brought to grumpy life by Edward James Hyland
• Ulysses, the canny statesman-like soldier played as a shrewd and smarmy politician by Corey Stoll
• Achilles, famed as much for his pride and petulance as for his prowess on the battlefield, from which he has abstained for some time*, was unexpectedly and marvelously played by “understudy,” KeiLyn Durrel Jones
• Patroclus, Achilles’ special friend lounging around the Greek camp tents played like a juvenile delinquent by Tom Pecinka
• Ajax, an oddly scrawny and remarkably dumb soldier related to both the Greeks and the Trojans played with humor and heart by Alex Breaux
• Diomedes, a hardened middle management level soldier well played by Zach Appelman

 *We learn later that this is to honor his other love, Trojan princess Polyxena

In Troy, the setting of the story, are 

• The valiant Hector, an honorable man, eldest son and heir to King Priam, passionately played by Bill Heck
• Paris, the arrogant lout who stole away Menelaus’s wife Helen and whose libidinous impulses started this whole mess, was coldly played by Maurice Jones
• Aeneas, a leading citizen soldier was adroitly and cleverly played by Sanjit De Silva
• Troilus, youngest son of Priam — “He eats nothing but doves, love, and that breeds hot blood, and hot blood begets hot thoughts, and hot thoughts beget hot deeds, and hot deeds is love.” — is played in pubescent heat by Andrew Burnap
• As the vulnerable young woman of the piece, in love, yet wise beyond her years, Ismenia Mendes does finely detailed work bringing Cressida to life onstage.
• Alexander, Cressida’s clever gossiping servant sets a light tone in the first act, competing with Pandarus for his mistress’ attention and favor.  Well portrayed by Nicholas Hoge
• In Troy we also meet Hector’s wife Andromache, silent until she can bear it no longer, bravely played by Tala Ashe
• Hector and Troilus’ sister, the prophetess Cassandra to whom no one listens, strikingly played by Nneka Okafor
• And Helen.  Not a typical Helen, this production gave us a fascinating portrayal of an unhappy woman who is guarded by armed men and supplied with wine.  This unusual choice was well played by Tala Ashe

KeiLyn Durrel Jones in rehearsal, not as Achilles in this photo.  Center is Corey Stoll rehearsing for Ulysses, and finally John Douglas Thompson as General Agamemnon.  

Daniel Sullivan’s production for Shakespeare in the Park is the best I have ever seen of this play.  It’s generically modern with soldiers in flak jackets, carrying guns as well as knives, the Trojans in black, the Greeks in desert war camouflage.  Laptops are used by Pandarus and Cressida to watch the parade of Trojan warriors returning to Ilion after a day of battle, as well as by the Greek military.  Ulysses’ long summation early in the first half of the play is enhanced by an amusing slide show.

David Zinn’s set easily turns from Troy’s hedonistic blood-red walls with a look of watered silk to the metallic gray Quonset hut walls of the Greek camp.  A level above the main playing area is put to excellent use by soldiers, the vile Thersites, this play’s unusual “clown” (nastily played by Max Casella), a betrayed and bereft Cressida, and also serves as a strategic lookout for Ulysses.

Ulysses is a particularly threatening character in this production, a corporate/government type, his uniform a white shirt, a suit and tie.  He instigates, cajoles, instructs the Greeks, sounding even tempered and sensible until his rage leaps out only to be restrained once more.  In the second half this wily manipulator plays Troilus against himself while condemning Cressida to the fate of all women in men’s wars, particularly those relegated to “camp follower.”

John Glover is a brilliant Pandarus, witty, lascivious, and romantic in his matchmaking of Troilus and Cressida — unless it was purely a power play to set himself up for better times to come.  Troilus starts out sweet, romantic, but turns into a weak fool, first by not stepping up or even speaking out for his purported love Cressida while the Trojans and Greeks barter her like a goat. By the end he turns against the woman he loves as she attempts to stay alive and avoid gang rape after being tossed alone and friendless into the Greek camp.  These are enemies to the Trojan state and likewise to her.  Troilus’ character slides downhill from the moment he attains what he thinks is his heart’s desire, the love of Cressida.

Lighting designed by Robert Wierzel and sound design by Mark Menard brought forth startling battle sounds of gunfire and explosions.  Brightly lit Trojan lovers contrasted with the gloomy grays of the Greek camp where Cressida is surrounded by soldiers hovering to pounce if her protector deserts her.

The fight scenes, choreographed by co-fight directors Michael Rossmy and Rick Sordelet, were tight and frightening, and the dread death of Hector, an act of cowardice and misplaced vengeance, was bloody and heartbreaking.

Women are silenced and used, Andromache left alone, Cassandra locked up, while Helen is imprisoned in Troy and Cressida is imprisoned in the Greek camp.  Very powerful statements clearly defined in this production. As Thersites says, “War and lechery confound all.” 

Bravo Daniel Sullivan, bravo Public Theatre, bravo to a fine cast and crew for this stellar production.  Oh, and bravo to William Shakespeare once again.

 

Tom Pecinka as Patroclus, David Harbour as Achilles (whom I did not see), and Max Casella as Thersites.
(Photo Credit Joan Marcus)

~ Molly Matera signing off to re-read the play. The opening of the play has been postponed due to an accident that befell David Harbour, scheduled to play Achilles.  The night I saw this play his understudy KeiLyn Durrel Jones gave an excellent performance, so I hope he takes over the role permanently.  Go wait on line in Central Park for this one, it’s worth it.  You can see a video excerpt of the production here:  https://youtu.be/cKSI4GCHhuk

Hoping a Limited Run Reappears with Joe Morton as Dick Gregory

Luckily for me, I caught Joe Morton in “Turn Me Loose” during its last week at The Westside Theatre. “Turn Me Loose” is “a play about comic genius Dick Gregory.” Based on how much I laughed for the 90-minute duration, I’d call that an accurate description.  Mind you, the play is as much about Dick Gregory the civil rights activist as it is about comedy, so there was plenty to ponder.

Joe Morton brought to vibrant and seething life Dick Gregory, a controversial comic who rose to fame just before and during the Civil Rights movement.  The audience was howling with laughter one moment, then particularly pensive as Mr. Morton enacted a dialogue between Mr. Gregory and Medgar Evers in the months prior to the latter's death.  The language, whether Mr. Morton was playing the young, the old, or middle-aged Gregory, was funny, provocative, angry, smart, and passionate. 

Joe Morton as Dick Gregory.  Photo Credit Sara Krulwich/NYT

Playwright Gretchen Law encapsulated Gregory’s extraordinary contribution to our nation’s conscience and comedy in a brief play (deftly performed on a practical, single set designed by Chris Barreca and lit by Stephen Strawbridge) with just two actors:  Mr. Morton giving a bravura performance as Mr. Gregory, and John Carlin doing captivating and imaginative work as a 60s stand-up comic, a heckler, a cabbie, and a radio interviewer, among others.  John Gould Rubin directs so that not a moment of raw, scathing wit is lost, nor is a moment of warmth for the man himself.

 

Morton as Gregory opposite John Carlin as a Radio Interviewer.  Photo credit Monique Carboni 

Every scene was engaging and thought provoking, every drop of sweat off Mr. Morton’s face endearing. 

The Westside Theatre’s downstairs performance space was an excellent venue for this penetrating production and I hope the play returns here or to another incarnation in an equally intimate space so those who missed this limited run might catch it next time around. 

Not only a fine evening of theatre at The Westside Theatre, but Dick Cavett was sitting in the row ahead of me!  Keep an eye out for a return or revival of Turn Me Loose.

~ Molly Matera, signing off to read a little not ancient enough history

Who is the Genius?

Genius is the rather ambiguous title of a film about Maxwell Perkins, who was the editor to the works of  several American literary geniuses of the first half of the 20^th century.  It’s based on the ambiguously titled biography of Perkins written by A. Scott Berg, “Maxwell Perkins:  Editor of Genius.”  Who is the genius Berg is talking about — this particular editor, or the authors whose work he nurtured to publication, novels by F. Scott Fitzgerald, Ernest Hemingway, and Thomas Wolfe, to name the three authors that appear in the film.  Who is the genius of the film’s title?  The writer Thomas Wolfe, or, as F. Scott Fitzgerald calls Max Perkins, the genius at friendship. 

Genius is a sweet little character study of a movie, visually convincing, gentle, welcoming the audience into its beautifully produced world (with the barest acknowledgment of the Depression).  Michael Grandage directed the script by John Logan based on Berg’s biography of the editor to Fitzgerald, Hemingway, Wolfe, and Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings, to name a few. 

While Genius purports to be based on the biography, it’s only a taste, a dram, an excerpt covering the years between when young Thomas Wolfe walked into Maxwell Perkins’ office at Charles Scribner’s Sons Publishers and Booksellers on Fifth Avenue with an overlong manuscript that would eventually be whittled down to become the very long novel, “Look Homeward, Angel.”  The younger man’s death in 1938, just over a decade after he walked into Perkins’ office, ends the story of the film.  Not even a third, in fact, of Perkins’ 37-year career as an editor of some of the most remarkable American authors of the first half of the 20^th century.  But the period it covers provides a beautiful stage for Colin Firth as Perkins and Jude Law as Wolfe to play together and become men of another time. 

Colin Firth is astute, smart, and heartfelt casting for Maxwell Perkins.  Repressed yet passionate, loving and compassionate but oh so quiet that his gentle smile is always a delightful surprise.  Maxwell Perkins was a nurturer, and Firth embraces us all.

Jude Law did deep and detailed character work in bringing the volatile Thomas Wolfe to life, apparently barely recognizable to some members of the audience when I saw the film, with his dark curly hair and southern accent contributing to his bold portrayal of the volatile young writer from Asheville.

 

Colin Firth as Maxwell Perkins and Jude Law as Thomas Wolfe.
Photo Credit: Marc Brenner/Roadside Attractions

How much like Thomas Wolfe was fellow southerner F. Scott Fitzgerald in his youth and health.  Here we see Fitzgerald as a middle-aged man weighed down by responsibility and reality.  Ernest Hemingway seems a mature sportsman, subdued yet warm and friendly, and prescient of young Wolfe’s eventual betrayal of his father figure Perkins.

Each famous writer is nicely played as a human being, not a famous author whose books we all read in high school.  Dominic West excels in his brief appearance as Ernest Hemingway.  Guy Pearce is a heartbreaking F. Scott Fitzgerald whose glory days are past, and whose wild and vivacious wife Zelda has sunken into mental illness.  In his exquisite sadness, it occurred to me Fitzgerald might have been glad the television series Endeavour did an adaptation of “The Great Gatsby” in a recent episode.

This shot appears several times in the film with the more modern buildings edited out!

Nicole Kidman did fine work as Wolfe’s paramour and sponsor, Mrs. Bernstein. She looked the part of the “older woman,” without vanity, which contributed to her believability. Some of the audience didn’t recognize her, either, until they saw her name in the credits, always a compliment to an actor.

Laura Linney was superb as Perkins’ wife Louise, aghast and downtrodden when Wolfe denigrated playwriting, her passion.  She was not merely someone’s wife or mother, she is a fully developed character, loving to her husband and children, angry when he chooses his work over a family vacation, rather judgmental of the married Mrs. Bernstein while still sympathetic.  Ms. Linney has grown into a remarkably sensitive actor whose every feeling is subtly offered to us. 

There are many pieces creating the whole of a film, and each element of Genius was of its time, the late 1920s through 1930s in New York City.  Music by Adam Cork was emotive without intruding, at one with fine cinematography by Ben Davis of a timely production design by Mark Digby.  In my mind’s eye the film is almost in black and white, although I know that it wasn’t.  Art direction by Alex Baily, Gareth Cousins, and Patrick Rolfe was complemented by costume design by Jane Petrie.

 

Firth as Perkins and Law as Wolfe commuting to Connecticut
Photo Credit: Marc Brenner/Roadside Attractions

John Logan, on the advice of biographer Berg, sensibly put the oft-read book aside to write the movie.  I read an article by a fellow who had read the excellent book and was very upset with all that was left out.  The biography of Max Perkins was about his life and his 37-year career.  Such things are difficult to cover in their entirety in a theatrical film.  Logan chose an dramatic segment with a volatile writer, and did a good job of it.

Much as I was captivated by the film, when I walked away from the theatre I felt something missing, only realizing what I missed as I wrote this.  I missed that whole story, which can only be apprehended by reading A. Scott Berg’s biography of Perkins and the works of Perkins’ authors.  If you want more, read the books.  If you want to stop in for a visit to 1930’s New York City and the fascinating people who lived and worked there, see the film, Genius.

~ Molly Matera, signing off to read….so many choices….

Austen’s Story of Lady Susan Translated by Whit Stillman into Film

Love & Friendship is a pretty bit of film.  Generally, it is the British — with a few notable exceptions — who make fabulous renderings of Jane Austen novels as feature films and television miniseries, and we know that the great lady’s stories and characters are as much at home in the 20^th and 21^st centuries as they were in the 18^th and 19^th centuries.

The thing is, I’ve never been a big fan of Kate Beckinsale or Chloë Sevigny and the film Love & Friendship did nothing to dispel my indifference to them as “actors.”  In the scenes in which they appeared, I wavered between boredom and annoyance.  They were not amusing.

When, however, they were either minimal accessories to a scene or entirely absent, those scenes were far more enjoyable and witty.

Xavier Samuel was quite at home in Jane Austen’s England as Reginald DeCourcy, son and heir to Sir of the same name, and brother to the wife of Lady Susan's brother-in-law.  Reginald is a gentleman with a stick up you know where — until he falls in love with the right young woman, that is, the sweet and soulful Morfydd Clark as Frederica Vernon.  Which I suspect is not a spoiler.

 

Kate Beckinsale as Lady Susan, Xavier Samuel as Reginald DeCourcy.

Emma Greenwell embodies the sweet character with sense and sensitivity, a totally Jane Austen heroine, Catherine DeCourcy Vernon.  Her husband Charles Vernon is that favorite of Jane Austen characters, a stodgy, not terribly bright, but loving and kindly husband, who was simply and beautifully played by Justin Edward. 

Jemma Redgrave and James Fleet were flawless as Lady and Sir Reginald DeCourcy.

Jenn Murray was delightfully horrid in a marvelous Jane Austen concoction, Lady Lucy Manwaring.

Tom Bennett was naturally and appropriately silly as Sir James Martin.

Ireland substituted marvelously for Kent and Surrey, just gorgeous.

Benjamin Esdraffo’s music was just right, as was Eimer Ni Mhaoldomhnaigh’s costume design.

All in all, the film Love & Friendship was fun, but not special.   Or perhaps just not as special as I had hoped it would be.  Making a film of an epistolary novel is quite a challenge, so the screenwriter /director Whit Stillman gets points for his taste and for even trying.  However, it does not quite work, not just because of the dull leads in Ms. Beckinsale and Ms. Sevigny (although it might have been an entirely other film with actors better suited to the roles of Lady Susan and Mrs. Johnson, respectively), but because...well, perhaps it was just those two miscast actors.  Or it may just be that letters to script work better on stage than on film…  perhaps the reading of the letters with scenes described being played behind the letter-reader until they take over the scene might work nicely onstage.... Good Jane Austen characters will not be kept down.

What this film did best was inspire me to re-read the great Jane Austen’s little-known novella, Lady Susan. In fact, why not the entire canon….

~ Molly Matera, signing off to read books…on paper and in hardcover….

Shakespeare – 400 years on

I am behind my time to write about Shakespeare, about the plays, about “what Shakespeare means to me.”  I am way behind in my writing in general, so this blog for Will is, perforce, short but I hope sweet.

W is for the Wily Words he made up  

I is for his Imagination beyond compare

L is for the Laughter he showed us all around

L is for the Love he loved to describe

S is for his Shaky historical accuracy

H is for his Heroes and Heroines

A is for the Annual count of the Shakespeare plays, films, adaptations, and books I’ve enjoyed...or not....

K is for the Kaleidoscopic range of characters, places, and times he brought onstage

E is for the Energy he creates in me

S is for the Sentimental love Songs

P is for his Perspicacious Psychological insight long before Freud and Jung 

E is for the Emotions his characters juggle in the plays and poetry

A is for the Alliance of Airy Sprites and Articulate Dames….

R is for the Remarkable and Ridiculous…..words words words

E is for the End….

We all know Will’s words are in our daily talk, chats, tweets.  In the year leading up to this, the 400^th anniversary of Shakespeare’s (or Willm Shakp, William Shaksper, Wm Shakspe, William Shakspere or Willm Shakspere) death (and possibly birth), he moved from my unconscious to conscious in the following ways:

The Theatre for a New Audience (“TFANA”) production of Pericles, Prince of Tyre  — http://www.mollyismusing.blogspot.com/2016/03/pericles-island-hopper.html

Also at TFANA, the Fiasco Theatre Company’s delightful, brisk, sharp and smart production of Two Gentlemen of Verona —

http://www.mollyismusing.blogspot.com/search/label/Austin%20Pendleton

Daniel Sullivan’s production of Cymbeline at the Delacorte last summer —

http://www.mollyismusing.blogspot.com/2015/08/cymbeline-or-imogen-and-false-reports.html

Which followed the early summer production of The Tempest directed by Michael Greif —

http://www.mollyismusing.blogspot.com/2015_06_01_archive.html

Last spring, I saw a play not by Shakespeare but rather about him.  Sort of:  Something Rotten.  What a lot of fun that was on Broadway —

http://www.mollyismusing.blogspot.com/2015_05_01_archive.html

This spring I’ve just see the Royal Shakespeare Company’s “King and Country:  Shakespeare’s Great Cycle of Kings,” comprising Richard II, Henry IV Part I, Henry IV Part II, and Henry V, playing in repertory at the Brooklyn Academy of Music.

Kenneth Branagh’s eponymous theatre company broadcast live his production The Winter’s Tale from London to New York —

http://www.mollyismusing.blogspot.com/2016/01/branaghs-return-as-actor-and-director.html

And Hamlet at London’s National theatre, broadcast live to Queens, NY, with the ubiquitous Benedict Cumberbatch —

http://www.mollyismusing.blogspot.com/2015/11/a-little-shakespeare-less-pinter.html

No matter how many Shakespeare plays I’ve seen, I’ll see them again in time to come.  Some will disappoint, some will exhilarate.  The plays, the good ones (no, they’re not all good) can weather all manner of interpretations, edits, stagings and filmings. I rejoice in them.

My recent breakfast reading is The Year of Lear: Shakespeare in 1606 by James Shapiro, about the events in England the year preceding Shakespeare’s writing of King Lear.  Fascinating background reading that put me in mind of last summer’s production of The Tempest in Central Park as I read Shapiro’s description of Ben Jonson’s Masque…everything’s connected.  Also reading Bill Bryson’s Shakespeare: The World As Stage, just for fun.

As always, thanks, Will.  The world would have a paucity of wondrous, witty words without you.

~ Molly Matera signing off to write about the Great Cycle of Kings playing in repertory at BAM until April 30^th.  And after that, to watch The Hollow Crown with the same four plays on film.

The Van Hove version of Arthur Miller's THE CRUCIBLE

Ivo Van Hove likes to deconstruct texts onstage, putting his stamp on other people’s ideas.  This typically means that a 2-hour play will run 3 or even 4 hours because of the extra bulk.  The “stamps” don’t necessarily add anything, but may rather detract from the original piece.

For instance, in his current version of Arthur Miller’s The Crucible playing at the Walter Kerr Theatre, he adds “supernatural” effects.  If you know Mr. Miller’s play ,or American history, you know the girls in Salem never saw a witch or a spirit.  A group of adolescent girls in Salem were trying to get themselves out of trouble for getting caught dancing in the woods in the dead of night — dancing at any time was forbidden in their culture — by pointing accusatory fingers at others.  If you don’t immediately understand (and it was quite clear in this production) that the girls were lying, you must have nodded off halfway through the first act.  So when Mr. Van Hove adds interludes of a girl levitating and the wrath of God in the way of a lightning storm with high winds blowing singed paper into the schoolroom as if there’d been an explosion in the next county, he confuses the issue.  He creates a lie on top of the lie that does not help get the point across.  At least not the point of Arthur Miller’s play.  He gives an excuse to the adults who go along with the girls and their lies and the hell they create in Salem village.  And there is no excuse for the actions of the “righteous” adults in Salem in The Crucible.

First Van Hove brings the action forward to a more modern time.  The classroom the curtain rises on had a generic bland look, the hard chairs occupied by girls in their 'tweens and teens.  They wore conservative private school pleated skirts, knee-highs and white blouses.  Modern and neat.  The scene designed by Jan Versweyveld is open and light, with a large blackboard at the back of the stage covered in drawings and occasionally words.  The greatest flaw to this scenic design is its freedom.  There is no ceiling, and the walls reach out to the edges of the stage.  It’s wide open and bright.  Salem was neither bright nor open. Just as importantly, Mr. Van Hove’s loosey goosey staging uses all the corners of the set, so the audience sitting house left or right cannot see what goes on there.  I’ve written about this issue in the past, when directors ignore the audience viewpoint by staging action where only those who can afford front and center can see it.  This is the responsibility of the director along with his designer.  This problem would not have arisen had Mr. Van Hove 1) considered the claustrophobic society that trapped his characters and 2) walked the auditorium to see what parts of his staging needed to be adjusted to the theatre.  Not everyone sits orchestra center.

The action starts on that banal classroom disrupted, desks and chairs overturned — perhaps to give the actors something to do later.  Van Hove (with his costume designer Wojciech Dziedzic) makes the Reverend Parris look like a modern Jesuit in a sloppy sweater.  The adult women wear something like loose gaucho pants with baggy tops, the men somewhat deconstructed business suits.  Once the play begins, the girls’ white blouses come untucked.  Hardly fitting for an overly restrictive society.

Abigail vs. Mary in the foreground surrounded by, L  to R, Hathorne, Parris, Danforth, Proctor.
Photo Credit 2016 Sara Krulwich, NYTimes

Jason Butler Harner as Reverend Samuel Parris did fine work, showing us the preacher’s desires for monetary recompense and the respect he believes should come with his position, revealing him to be an articulate but weak man.  It is impossible to trust that he ever truly believed the girls, but maybe that’s as it should be.

Tina Benko does her job as Ann Putnam, but still doesn’t make that hard-hearted character come to life, any more than Thomas Jay Ryan does for her husband Thomas Putnam.  Brenda Wehle does not embody Rebecca Nurse when she enters, seeming to rely too much on her age to appear a village elder.  She does not reflect the strength of character Goody Nurse has that makes the whole village respect her.

Everything was rather dreary and stiff in not-old Salem with not-old-fashioned people speaking Mr. Miller’s lines intended for 17^th century characters, until Ben Whishaw entered the playing space.  He cast the perfectly competent Mr Harner into the shade.  Whishaw, while not physically imposing, took over the stage and the theatre, with his dark voice and straightforward talk.  He embodied John Proctor, the voice of reason from an imperfect man in a world gone mad.  For the rest of the play, we only wait for him to return to the stage.  He did have a rather unfortunate habit of jumping on people, which became distracting in his penultimate scenes.  I get it.  I just don’t think it worked.

The greatest disappointment of this production was Saoirse Ronan, whose film work I quite like.  As Abigail Williams, the teenaged seductress, she was shrill, stiff, “johnny one note” throughout.  She clearly had no vocal training or prior stage experience, which is unfortunate if her film experience led her to believe all would be fixed in the editing room.  It’s easy to see why the other girls fear her, hard to see why anyone would feel “softly” toward her.

As for the other girls:  Jenny Jules’ turn as Tituba, the Reverend Parris’ slave from Barbados, is grounded and appropriately amusing until threatened into submission. Elizabeth Teeter as Betty Parris has fine powers of concentration as she’s mauled about while “sleeping,” Ashlei Sharpe Chestnut as Susanna and Erin Wilhelmi as Mercy Lewis were barely noticeable.  Standout here was Tavi Gevinson as Mary Warren.  Initially Ms. Gevinson rather annoyed me as she seemed to be attempting to channel Scarlett Johansson.  By the second half, though, she’d gathered her strength and wits and did fine work as the torn participant in the travesty that was the Salem witch trials, suffering through her dilemma:  To be a part of the in crowd and do evil is one thing.  To step outside of that crowd and do good is dangerous. 

Elizabeth Teeter, Saoirse Ronan, and Tavi Gevinson

Jim Norton played the litigious Giles Corey with heart and humor.  It was easy to believe this man was a friend of many in his community, making that community’s betrayal and murder of him and his wife all the more appalling. 

The revered Reverend Hale entered Salem full of pomp and confidence and left broken.  His blind arrogance had a great deal to do with the growth of this ridiculous story told by guilty children into an all-consuming monster.  Bill Camp was competent enough in the role but neither deep nor varied. 

By the time we met Francis Church, his wife Rebecca was already falsely imprisoned so Ray Anthony Thomas had only the opportunity to plead for justice for his wife, his friends, and himself.  His performance was on the mark for the scene that leads its hearers to assume the play is really about the McCarthy hearings and naming names.  This is echoed at the end of the play by John Proctor when he retracts his false confession because his name is all he has left.  Nicely done, Mr. Miller and Mr. Thomas.

Sophie Okonedo was rather dull as Elizabeth Proctor offering us none of the character’s layers.  I expected more of Ms. Okonedo.

Ben Whishaw as John Proctor with Tavi Gevinson as Mary Warren, and Ciarán Hinds as Deputy Governor Danforth..

I looked forward to the entrance of Ciarán Hinds as Deputy Governor Danforth in the second act, and was not disappointed.  Mr. Hinds can command a stage and every other person on it as if he were born to that power.  His embodiment of Danforth assured us that the real Danforth is still burning in hell.  The only fault was that he seemed too intelligent to be so easily taken in by Abigail Williams, especially Ms. Ronan’s Abigail.

Teagle F. Bougere as Judge Hathorne postured and recited lines, as did Michael Braun as Ezekiel Cheever.  Those characters had beliefs and flaws, but these actors did not seem to know it.

Philip Glass music underscores the story, rarely overpowering it.  Favorite scene (that Mr. Miller did not write) gave us a wolf examining the stage.  A nifty scare.

Two final points about Mr. Van Hove’s direction.  First, the staging was clumsy, the playing space overlarge.  Bring the set in a little tighter or don’t stage scenes in the far corners.  Finally, I must wonder:  Are the dull performances of some of the secondary and tertiary characters the fault of the actors or the director?  Does Mr. Van Hove prefer the characters who are not primaries to fade into the background like chairs?  Does he not bother to work with those actors to develop their performances?  If all his focus was on Ms. Ronan, he surely failed.

Somehow despite the three hours it took Mr. Van Hove to tell this tale, his production did not tell the story of the play.  It is an important story and always relevant, and this lost opportunity is a shame.

In short, I prefer Mr. Miller’s version of his play to that of Mr. Van Hove.

~ Molly Matera, signing off to re-read a play I first read when I was 12 years old.  Full disclosure:  Decades ago, I played Abigail Williams in a touring production of the play with far fewer actors and a portable set.  It was one of the joys of my life as well as an extraordinary education. Maybe it’s better to not have as big a budget as Mr. Van Hove clearly had.  Kudos to the imaginative director of that past traveling production, Eric Hoffmann.  And R.I.P. to its fine Reverend Parris, the late Michael Graves.