Tempest (no teapot)
Mar. 26th, 2008 10:52 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
magidSunday I went to ASP's production of The Tempest (Shakespeare) at the Cambridge Multicultural Arts Center. It's a lovely production.
I expected the space to be set up mostly in the round, as it has been for the other plays they've put on there. It was not. Instead, there was a thrust stage from one side of the room, leaving the stairs to the wrap-around walkway on the second level available. Not a regular rectangular thrust, either, but one with a narrow neck leading to a circular area, looking rather like a silhouette of the almost spherical lights that lined the edges of the stage. (And, as it turned out, a number of trap doors.)
As soon as things started, it became clear that this was a Tempest as Victorian illusionist, with the stage echoing the same ear as the costuming. Prospero's magic garment was his illusionist's cape, and Ariel was his female assistant, dressed in similarly evocative clothes (but not period: too much fishnetted leg for that, I think. But the top hat with netting, gold-embroidered vest over corset, and boots all felt right.). The others were gentlemen, with wonderful hats. (I so wanted their hats!)
The opening scene was wonderful. There was a table with a model ship on it. Prospero came out with a hooop with which he encircled it, then Ariel slowly raised it from the walkway, using a fishing rod (I'm still not sure exactly how). As it rose, white fabric rose beneath it, then that was spread out, completely covering the stage, held by all the mariners at the edges, at an angle, showing the ship bobbing in the middle. And the mariners provided the sound effects, the winds and juddering. Just wonderful; it felt like a piece of magic.
There were some other wonderful moments, with interesting sound effects (the instrumentation varied from sheets of metal to kazoos to a huge not-a-cello to more usual stringed instruments), or moments of comedy (Trinculo is played as, and dressed as, a jester, ably done by John Kuntz, and abetted by Stephano (Robert Walsh); the three goddesses (all men in dresses of primary colors, artistically woodenly (weird, yet true) going through their playlets); Ariel's tricks). Oh, and I have to mention that the three goddesses playlets finished with others joining them to do a sword dance (the swords oddly flxible, the blades able to be bent in a half circle), all intertwined by holding different ends of the weapons, then coming clear into one person holding them up in a star-like figure that I've seen before from Pinkfish's dancing. Very cool.
The only fly in the ointment* of my content with the show was the lighting above the back of the stage, which, when full, shone brightly in my eyes. This was both distracting and uncomfortable, and I kept one hand up to shade my eyes much of the time. I assume this wouldn't have been as much of a problem had I not been sitting in the middle of the first row, though.
On the whole, a lovely production.
Also, they've announced next year's lineup (I'm intending to get a subscription again):
The Merchant of Venice (November 3 – December 7)
The Duchess of Malfi (John Webster, not Shakespeare; their fisr foray into other plays of the period)(January 15 – February 8)
Coriolanus (March 19 – April 12)
Much Ado About Nothing (May 14 – June 7)
* Typing it now, I want to make that "oinkment." Pigs do seem pretty content most of the time...
I expected the space to be set up mostly in the round, as it has been for the other plays they've put on there. It was not. Instead, there was a thrust stage from one side of the room, leaving the stairs to the wrap-around walkway on the second level available. Not a regular rectangular thrust, either, but one with a narrow neck leading to a circular area, looking rather like a silhouette of the almost spherical lights that lined the edges of the stage. (And, as it turned out, a number of trap doors.)
As soon as things started, it became clear that this was a Tempest as Victorian illusionist, with the stage echoing the same ear as the costuming. Prospero's magic garment was his illusionist's cape, and Ariel was his female assistant, dressed in similarly evocative clothes (but not period: too much fishnetted leg for that, I think. But the top hat with netting, gold-embroidered vest over corset, and boots all felt right.). The others were gentlemen, with wonderful hats. (I so wanted their hats!)
The opening scene was wonderful. There was a table with a model ship on it. Prospero came out with a hooop with which he encircled it, then Ariel slowly raised it from the walkway, using a fishing rod (I'm still not sure exactly how). As it rose, white fabric rose beneath it, then that was spread out, completely covering the stage, held by all the mariners at the edges, at an angle, showing the ship bobbing in the middle. And the mariners provided the sound effects, the winds and juddering. Just wonderful; it felt like a piece of magic.
There were some other wonderful moments, with interesting sound effects (the instrumentation varied from sheets of metal to kazoos to a huge not-a-cello to more usual stringed instruments), or moments of comedy (Trinculo is played as, and dressed as, a jester, ably done by John Kuntz, and abetted by Stephano (Robert Walsh); the three goddesses (all men in dresses of primary colors, artistically woodenly (weird, yet true) going through their playlets); Ariel's tricks). Oh, and I have to mention that the three goddesses playlets finished with others joining them to do a sword dance (the swords oddly flxible, the blades able to be bent in a half circle), all intertwined by holding different ends of the weapons, then coming clear into one person holding them up in a star-like figure that I've seen before from Pinkfish's dancing. Very cool.
The only fly in the ointment* of my content with the show was the lighting above the back of the stage, which, when full, shone brightly in my eyes. This was both distracting and uncomfortable, and I kept one hand up to shade my eyes much of the time. I assume this wouldn't have been as much of a problem had I not been sitting in the middle of the first row, though.
On the whole, a lovely production.
Also, they've announced next year's lineup (I'm intending to get a subscription again):
The Merchant of Venice (November 3 – December 7)
The Duchess of Malfi (John Webster, not Shakespeare; their fisr foray into other plays of the period)(January 15 – February 8)
Coriolanus (March 19 – April 12)
Much Ado About Nothing (May 14 – June 7)
* Typing it now, I want to make that "oinkment." Pigs do seem pretty content most of the time...