Seattle Shakespeare Company opened its 21st season with A Midsummer’s Night’s Dream, at the Intiman Playhouse. The director, Sheila Daniels, had a special twist on this play about the nature of love and male/ female relationships, which was right on the money in terms of updating the play, yet staying true to the text.
A Midsummer’s Night’s Dream tells the story of six different couples in various stages of coupling-Titania and Oberon are an established “couple” having spats, Titania and Bottom are having a fling, Pyramus and Thisby are star-cross lovers, Theseus, Duke of Athens, is about to marry the Queen of the Amazons’, Hippolyta, whom he won by the “sword”. Helena is in love with Demetrius, who covets Hermia, who loves Lysander. The play opens with the testosterone-driven Egeus, Hermia’s father, trying to invoke Athenian law and force his daughter to marry against her will. There is a long tirade as he blusters about his privileges as a father, in a male-dominated society.
Cleverly Daniels presented Lysander as a lesbian, named Lysandra, which added another complex dimension to Egeus’s lines about Lysandra “bewitching” his child. It also modernizes his rage. This is in contrast to the marriage of Hippolyta, a female warrior who ruled a society, where men are only tolerated for purposes of procreation. Thesus, the male won over the strong female, but Lysandra and Hermia win over male domination. The ensuing confusion in the forest, where the fairies use magical herbs to make Demetrius and Lysandra fall in love with Helena is hilarious, because not only is a man, who had previously rejected her, in love with her, but so is the lesbian lover of her best friend.
This production emphasized the malevolent and destructive aspects of the forest-dwelling fairies. Forests at the time represented a place where the emotions, both positive and negative, were able to burst forth and wreak havoc on humans and the rules regulating civilized societies were suspended. As a result the costumes were not Disneyish pretty but exotic and sinister. The set, music and dance numbers in the forest supported this interpretation and helped make the forest a liberating but dangerous place.
Unfortunately, with the exception of Allison Strickland as Hermia, Reginald André Jackson as Oberon, Qadriyyah Shabazz as Hippolyta, and at times Tick Danneker as Demetrius, the actors were not sufficiently vocally skilled to handle the text. The diction was mumbled, not everything was heard in the 2nd to back row where I was sitting, and the majority of the actors could not make the language come alive. As a result the play was fairly boring. Listening to the vocal strain of Theseus, Titania and Helena and the artificial verbal gimmicks of Puck was unpleasant. Voices without adequate breath support frequently broke and it was an evening of sibilant “S’s” When Puck, played by Chris Enweiler, decided to drop the verbal gimmicks and just speak to the audience in his last speech “If we shadows have offended” his natural voice came through, the text came alive and he made a connection with the audience.
Although the costumes for the fairies worked well, the costumes for the mortals were disastrous. All the Athenians were clad in classical garments of a vibrant imposing medium blue color, which looked fine on the actors with dark complexions, Hippolyta and Hermia, but did not suit the fair-skinned actors. The blue color emphasized the pasty white skin of the fair-skinned actors, which I found unappealing and distracting. Also the blue color in the costumes clashed with a totally unnecessary red carpet in the first scene. Theseus’ warrior costume in the final scene looked like a very bad Halloween costume made of plastic. In addition, the actors’ faces were washed out by the lights and the lack of make-up.
Since this was a language play, it could have been staged without a set, costumes, music or choreography, language was the most important element of the production and it was not up to par. This production had a lot of potential and in general was well-directed; unfortunately, the actors needed to be more competent vocally.
A MIDSUMMER’S NIGHT’S DREAM, by William Shakespeare, Seattle Shakespeare Company, Intiman Playhouse at Seattle Center, 201 Mercer Street, Seattle. Oct 20-Nov. 13. Thurs-Sat 7:30 PM, selected matinees Sat. and Sun at 2 pm. www.seattleshakespeare.org (206) 733-8222 ( Parking is difficult, it is recommended to take the bus.)