Part One:
Geoffrey Sherman is stepping down this Summer at the end of his 12-year stint as Producing Artistic Director at the Alabama Shakespeare Festival; so it is fitting that his last Shakespeare production is The Tempest, acknowledged as the Bard's last play written alone [without collaborators], and one that many scholars believe is his farewell to the stage through the figure of the play's protagonist Prospero, played here by Esau Pritchett, seen recently at ASF in Dauphin Island.
The version of The Tempest that Sherman is presenting is "a transcription for contemporary voices" by Kenneth Cavander, one of many playwrights commissioned by the Oregon Shakespeare Festival's "Play on!" series -- more about that project follows below -- and whose Timon of Athens played at ASF a couple of seasons ago. A curious choice.
The story opens with a storm at sea and a shipwreck with the King of Naples and his retinue on board, the "tempest" caused by Prospero, the ousted Duke of Milan who, with his 4-year-old daughter Miranda, was set adrift years ago and landed on an uncharted island. Here, Prospero discovered magic, enslaved the monster Caliban and the sprite Ariel who do his bidding with varying degrees of resistance. -- As the now teenaged Miranda worries about the shipwrecked passengers, Prospero assures her they are not harmed and decides it is time for her to know her origins and learn later of his intentions of revenge and ultimate forgiveness.
The lengthy exposition establishes secondary stories of the aristocrats' inner fighting and murder plots, the clowns' drunkenness and attachment to Caliban in a plot to take over the island by killing Prospero, and the deliberate separation of the King's son Ferdinand from the others in order to manage a contrived meeting with Miranda and their instant romance. -- Keeping these disparate groups apart till the penultimate scene affords audiences some suspense leading up to the inevitable gathering of all the characters and the discovery of Prospero's intentions.
Part Two:
Sherman's production has a lot of things going for it to delight the eye and ear: romantic costumes [Pamela Scofield], evocative musical composition [James Conely] and sound score [William H.Burns], complimentary scenery [James Wolk] and lighting [Kendall Smith], several magical special effects, stunning video projections [Brad Peterson] that establish locations and atmosphere, and talented and committed ensemble actors.
James Bowen's and Rodney Clark's buffoonery as the clownish Trinculo and Stephano eke out some sympathy for their predicament and drunken behavior; and their lording it over Caliban offers the pretensions of lower class men attempting to act like aristocrats.
Paul Hebron's sympathetic portrayal of Gonzalo, the old councillor who aided Prospero in his escape and who here adds a needed dignity to the aristocracy; especially as King Alonzo [Larry Tobias], his brother Sebastian [Jason Martin], and Prospero's brother Antonio [John Manfredi] who had usurped the Dukedom from Prospero years ago, are by and large a mean-spirited group.
As the love-at-first-sight couple, Ferdinand [Seth Andrew Bridges] and Miranda [Christina King] demonstrate an adolescent innocence along with appropriate excessive emotions. We, along with Prospero who had set this all up, approve of their union from the start; and their relationships with Prospero [father/daughter; father-in-law/son-in-law] are instantly recognizable.
Relationships are strained between Prospero and Caliban [Brik Berkes]. Mr. Berkes imbues the role with credible resentment [he once had the island to himself]; and though Prospero had treated him nicely at first, he turned on him when Caliban attempted to violate Miranda. As he says: "You taught me language; and my profit on 't/Is, I know how to curse."
As the sprite Ariel, Erin Chupinsky does Prospero's bidding willingly, but is eager for the freedom from bondage that Prospero had promised. Ms. Chupinksy is an adept dancer and singer, and seems to delight in the various tricks and magic that Prospero commands of Ariel. -- There is a bond between them that is expressed gently in their final moments together.
A commanding presence, Mr. Pritchett's Prospero is, by turns, paternal, authoritative, compassionate, vengeful, driven, and contemplative -- a many-dimensioned character who can turn on a dime and have audiences engaged throughout. Well done.
Part Three:
Elizabethan audiences went to "hear" a play, much like we go to "see" a play. So, it is not unusual for the production values in modern staging to receive much of the audiences' attention, sometimes distracting us from the sound of the words and the words themselves. -- For a long time, productions of Shakespeare have been edited, adapted, set in exotic locales and time periods, had all female casts, and been subjected to post-apocalyptic interpretations. So, it is common enough to attend a non-traditional rendering. And directors have regularly updated occasional antiquated words.
The "Play on!" project has been debated since its inception, questioning whether there is a need for updating scripts so contemporary audiences will find them more accessible. One camp believes that such "translations" will make them clearer, can attract new audiences, and stand side by side with the original scripts. Another camp believes that changing Shakespeare's vocabulary and versification dumbs-down the originals and condescends to today's audiences who, given productions by classically trained actors who make the words effortlessly comprehensible, will most certainly understand them; and that the richness of Shakespeare's words and the robustness of his verse must be preserved.
"Do no harm" is the charge given to all 36 "Play on!" writers: "don't add personal politics, don't fix Shakespeare's structure, observe the rigors of language [meter, rhythm, metaphor, imagery, rhyme, rhetoric, and structural content]; but go line-by-line, updating antiquated language, but retaining as much of the original as didn't need change".
While Cavander's script does retain much of Shakespeare's original [Prospero's major monologues, for example, and some familiar lines: "We are such stuff as dreams are made on..." and "O brave new world...", for example], many of the changes have rendered a less than vibrant dialogue and a flatness to the verse that the actors must rise above.
The beauty of Shakespeare's language is in part the sound of it. I missed luxuriating in that in listening to Cavander's version, despite the visual delight of this production.
