(L to R) The Angus Bowmer Theatre, the Elizabethan Theatre, the New Theatre. Ashland, Oregon.
As I’ve stated elsewhere, the reason we went to Ashland was to attend the Oregon Shakespeare Festival. I’ve been a big Shakespeare fan for years (some of you long time readers may remember my visit to London’s Globe Theatre in 1998), so the thought of seeing Shakespeare performed by one of the most acclaimed acting companies in the United States was too tempting to pass up.
The Oregon Shakespeare Festival was founded in 1935 by Agnus Bowmer, a professor at Southern Oregon University. What started out as a couple of plays performed over a three day weekend in a building whose roof had collapsed has turned into a 16 play festival performed over nine months and three theatres. While long noted as a premier theatre attraction, the Festival received its highest publicity in 2003 when Time Magazine named it as one of the best regional theatre companies in the United States.
Since this was our first trip to Oregon, we wanted to see as much of the countryside as possible. So, we limited our Festival attendance to two plays: Antony and Cleopatra, and Romeo and Juliet. I ordered the tickets over the phone, which turned out to be an easy process. We received them five days after we ordered them: a very reasonable turnaround time, if I may say so.
I’ll provide a brief mention about the venues before I get into the plays themselves. As I said before, the Festival has three theatres. The largest, the Elizabethan Theatre, is an open air structure used primarily for evening performances. We didn’t attend any plays at this venue, because its season hadn’t started when we were visiting. The next largest theatre, the Agnus Bowmer, is used to stage a variety of lesser known plays, including some innovative productions of Shakespeare’s works. Finally, the aptly named New Theatre is used to stage experimental productions of new and old plays.
It was in the New Theatre that we saw our first production: Antony and Cleopatra. The first thing that struck me was the theatre’s intimacy. The stage was surrounded by seats, which made the audience feel like they were part of the action. This feeling was heightened by the building’s various doors, which were utilized by the actors for their entrances and exits. It was a little startling to have an actor suddenly appear next to an audience member, but it soon became unremarkable. The interesting staging was complimented by the set design, which was minimal but effective.
Despite these enjoyable qualities, I ended up thinking this version of Antony and Cleopatra was weak. My opinion stemmed from poor decisions made by the three lead actors. As played by Judith Marie Bergin, Cleopatra was an older woman trying to act young. While I agreed with that portion of the characterization, I didn’t agree with Bergin’s display of this attempt at youth, which manifested itself in a series of over the top vocalizations directed at all the cast. I could see Cleopatra doing that in her public displays, but I thought it would be more effective if she put away the public persona when she was not around others and more quietly confronted her mortality. Bergin’s display was offset by Armando Duran’s portrayal of Marc Antony. Duran played Antony as a man who seems confused by the events around him and the fact that his physical strength seems to be useless. Again, I agree with part of Duran’s portrayal (specifically, the part that Antony’s strength is useless in this play). But, I thought Duran didn’t effectively portray Antony’s confidence in that physical strength. To me, Antony’s problem is that he is so confident in his strength that he doesn’t see the danger until it is too late. It is at this point that he becomes too confused to act. Duran seemed more interested in playing up Antony’s confusion throughout the play. It just didn’t seem to be the right tone to me. But, the actor who really missed his character’s tone was Kevin Kenerly. Kenerly played Octavius as a very physical being who could match Antony’s macho. I’ve always thought of Octavius as someone who won with his mind, not his brawn. To me, that’s one of the points Shakespeare was trying to make…specifically, that the era where mental prowess instead of brawn determined power began when Rome became an empire. But, Kenerly portrayed Octavius as an individual who won because he was more physical than Antony. Kenerly’s performance, along with Duran and Bergin’s, not only set an inaccurate tone, but also diminished some of the key points that Shakespeare was trying to make.
Despite my misgivings about the main characters, there were other elements that I enjoyed in Antony and Cleopatra. The innovative staging and the excellent performances by the actors in the secondary roles, particularly Crystal Fox and G. Valmont Thomas, elevated this production to a higher level than it was left by its lead actors. Still, I wondered if the same flaws that plagued Antony and Cleopatra would haunt the other play we were seeing: Romeo and Juliet. These fears were heightened when I bought the tickets and was warned me that this was a “modern” production.
We saw Romeo and Juliet in the Agnus Bowmer Theatre. This venue was in the shape of the classic theatre setting (with seats in an auditorium setting around the front of a stage). But, while the setting was classic, the production itself was (as was advertised) modern. All of the characters dressed in Armani, the “coming out” party for Juliet was a rave, and the set decoration was stark and minimalist. But, placing this classic in the modern world turned out not to be jarring. Instead, it reminded me of the timelessness inherent in the play’s themes and emotions. I wasn’t the only one who thought the staging was appropriate. Dianne thought that putting the play in the modern world helped make the characters more relevant and easier to identify. For her, who is not as familiar with Shakespeare, this quality greatly helped her enjoyment of the play.
The one aspect of this production that I found surprising was the decision to accentuate the comedic aspects inherent the play. But, even that decision turned out to be a wise one. It allowed the audience to see how this play could have been a comedy with the change of just a few lines. It also brought home the concept that there is a thin line in life between a happy ending and a tragic ending.
None of this could have been possible without superb acting. While the entire cast was magnificent, both lead roles were noteworthy for their acting excellence. Kevin Kenerly, whom I disliked in Antony and Cleopatra, seemed to be better suited for the role of Romeo. He still played the role with a lot of physicality. But, he also added the confused anger that plagues Romeo’s character throughout the play. As a result, it was easy to find sympathy in Romeo’s fate. But, Kenerly’s portrayal paled in comparison to Nancy Rodriguez’s transcendent Juliet. Rodriguez perfectly captured the combination of innocence, petulance, and tenderness that is Juliet. Best of all, I actually believed that Rodriguez was a teenage girl portraying herself. Her fantastic performance lifted the production above the familiar play everyone knows.
All in all, our experience at the Oregon Shakespeare Festival produced one hit and one miss. But, we enjoyed the high quality of the productions. And, both plays became wonderful discussion fodder between both and our hosts at the B&B. In short, both Dianne and I agreed that the Festival’s reputation was well deserved. The productions were faithful to Shakespeare’s work, while innovative enough to take the plays out of the realm of cliché and make them relevant. Any production that accomplishes those tasks is worth attending. And, that’s why Dianne and I plan to visit the Oregon Shakespeare Festival again in the near future.
2004 Update – The “near future” turned out to be only thirteen months later. This time, the emphasis of our trip was the plays. Thus, we saw three plays in three days. As was the case with our first Festival experience, there were some hits and misses. Overall though, we thoroughly enjoyed our second time at the Festival.
The first play we saw was A Raisin in the Sun. No, this play wasn’t written by Shakespeare. It was written by Lorraine Hansberry in the late 1950s. However, it is considered one of the major works in American theatre because of its stark and honest portrayal of African American family life just before the Civil Rights movement. While its reputation is impeccable, I found myself hoping that I’d be watching a good production. Because the entire play is set in one room of an apartment, A Raisin in the Sun, more than other plays, relies on the actors portraying the roles to convey the script’s power. I was pleased to discover that the Festival’s troupe was more than up to the challenge. I was especially impressed with Crystal Fox (whom had impressed me the previous year) and Aisha Kabia in the play’s two lead female roles. I was less impressed with Chris Butler, whose performance in the lead male role was too one-note for me. Even with this slight disappointment, I still found the entire acting troupe to effectively portray the emotions that make A Raisin in the Sun relevant even though it is set some 50 years ago.
Having enjoyed the first play we saw, I was especially anxious to see the next play for which we had tickets: The Comedy of Errors. Even though many critics diminish it by noting that it was Shakespeare’s first play, I’ve always enjoyed the manic energy and preposterous circumstances that populate The Comedy of Errors. I became hopeful that the play might meet my expectations when I saw that the audience was populated with purple shirt/red hat wearing women. I later found out that these women were all part of a social club from various places in California who were up in Ashland for the day to see a play and enjoy the town. Unintentional as it was, their presence set a complimenting tone to the play’s “anything goes” atmosphere. Still, I was interested to see how the company would address the play’s two major hurdles. The first hurdle lies with the play’s setting. The audience has to be convinced that Syracuse is the sort of town where two sets of identical twins could roam about freely and no one would be able to tell them apart. To get over this hurdle, the production turned Syracuse into a Las Vegas style resort. The setting gave the play the outlandishness that is necessary for the audience to suspend disbelief at the play’s many coincidences. The other hurdle that the company addressed was the treatment of the central characters. Many productions find this part of the play problematic, because the central characters are two sets of identical twins. With few identical twin actors in the world, acting companies have to think of a variety of ways to portray the lead characters. For this production, the company decided to have one actor play each set of twins. I was wondering how this strategy would work since the twins meet each other at the play’s end. But, thanks to some very clever staging and the use of doubles (who had their backs to the audience), the artifice succeeded. With both of the play’s technical problems overcome, I could just enjoy the play for the comedy it is. And, enjoy it I did. My enjoyment was made stronger by the fantastic acting done by Ray Porter and Christopher DuVal as Antipholus and Dromio, respectively. Crystal Fox and Aisha Kabia also deserve praise in their roles as Adriana (Antipholus of Syracuse’s wife) and Luciana (Adriana’s sister). All in all, this was a production that more than met my expectations.
We were batting two for two in our play selection. But, I knew we were going to be watching the most challenging play of the three for which we had purchased tickets: Much Ado About Nothing. I’ve always found this to be a problematic play, because it seems like Shakespeare didn’t know what to do with it. He appeared to start writing a “happy ending” version of Romeo And Juliet (as is evidenced by the Claudio/Hero story), but got bored with it and started focusing on a love story between two older people (Benedick/Beatrice). The problem is that the two stories don’t mesh very well. Thus, the play needs two strong actors in the roles of Benedick and Beatrice in order to pull the whole play together. It can be done, as is evidenced by the version filmed by Kenneth Branagh. However, it usually falls flat. Such was the case with this production. I thought that Brent Harris (as Benedick) and Robin Goodrin Nordli (as Beatrice) were fine when they were on the stage by themselves. However, I never saw any chemistry between the two of them. In fact, I thought that the two actors disliked each other instead of being in love with one another. Without that connection, the play fell apart for me. I also didn’t enjoy how the play’s few dramatic elements were downplayed in order to accentuate the comedic elements. By taking this step, I thought this production lost whatever grounding in reality that the play contained. Still, I did enjoy the venue where we saw the production. It was the first play that we saw in the Elizabethan Theatre, and I hope it isn’t the last. This open air theatre has wonderful acoustics and a multi-level stage that can handle anything Shakespeare throws at it. I just wish the production had been equal to the stage.
As was the case with the previous year, we found more enjoyable play-going experiences than “not enjoyable ones. But, all of the plays we attended were marked with good acting, innovative staging, and a commitment to the spirit of the plays presented. Our second visit just reaffirmed the feelings we felt after our first trip: namely, that the Oregon Shakespeare Festival provides superb entertainment. I’m glad we made the trip back to Ashland, and I’m looking forward to our next venture up north.
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