Every year, I go with friends to see plays at the Shakespeare Festival in Ashland, Oregon. There are two performances a day, a matinee at 1:30 pm and an evening performance at 8 pm. There are three theaters, one of which, the outdoor Elizabethan stage, has performances only in the evening. The cast and the audience would melt at a matinee; it can get very hot here in the summer.
About half the plays are by Shakespeare. Some of the rest are world premieres. Some of those will probably not be seen again. Some, like the drawing-room comedies, are hardy perennials.
In any given week, there are usually 9 plays on the boards. We arrive on Tuesday afternoon, after a 6-hour drive from San Francisco, and we see 8 plays, back to back, which takes us through the Saturday matinee. We have a big blowout dinner on Saturday night and then drive back on Sunday.
Since we can't see all 9 plays, we have to choose which one to skip. That's often hard, and sometimes we make the wrong choice. Two summers ago, we chose Our Town at the Elizabethan Theater instead of A Midsummer Night's Dream at the larger indoor theater, the Bowmer Theater. It was the wrong choice because we all disliked Our Town, and seriously wondered why this play is ever done at all. And we heard that Midsummer was fabulous. I came back in October, on a day where I could see my favorite Shakespeare play from that summer, Coriolanus, at a matinee, and Midsummer in the evening. It was indeed fabulous, literally and figuratively.
Here are notes on the plays we saw this summer (written as the week went on).
Tuesday night:
Henry IV, Part 1 (or as I like to say, Henry 4.1, to be followed by 4.2 and 5.0). I liked this play; my friends mostly didn't. With rare exception, the acting is always outstanding here, but sometimes the production, or direction, or even the play itself, leave something to be desired. John Tufts plays Prince Henry (to become 5.0), or Hal as he is called here. In Act I, he's the prodigal son, hanging out with low-lifes, indeed, some truly revolting low-lifes, much to the chagrin of his father (4.1). I like Tufts, a CMU graduate. For one thing, he's tall, dark, and handsome (well, that's three things), and that helps but it's not nearly enough to get you lead roles here. While he often plays leads in some plays, he, like everyone else, plays bit parts in other plays. I first remember his as Romeo at the Elizabethan, which Christine Albright as Juliet. Both talented young actors, they made the young lovers seem entirely credible, and the bedroom scene was steamy indeed. He played one forest Fairies in that fabulous performance I returned to see. The production was done in 80's disco version, complete with singing, and an incredibly enthusiatic audience, decades younger, on average, than the crowd that shows up in August.
Wednesday matinee:
Hamlet. The title role is played by Don Donohue, who is a brilliant actor and perhaps the most popular actor in Ashland. The performance begins while the audience is still noisily filing in, with a scene just after the funeral of Hamlet's father: a casket, many rows of chairs, and only one person left: Hamlet. As the other chairs are all put away, only one is left. Then Hamlet leaves, the lights dim, and the play begins. This is done in modern dress; Hamlet wears a jacket, a skinny tie, and sunglasses.
The play-proper begins on the walls of the castle. The guards are in camouflage, with lights attached to their automatic weaons. There are security cameras on the walls, blinking, turning, producing a Big Brother effect. The Ghost of Hamlet's father is barely visible in a flickering lighting effect, but he gradually becomes more corporeal. The one aspect of this production that I disliked was the use of Howie Seago, an actor who is deaf, as the Ghost. He and his family communicate using American Sign Language. In fact, the family use ASL even when talking to each about the dead king. In his conversations with the Ghost, Hamlet speaks most of the Ghost's lines, translating for us. But he doesn't translate everything, and there are long sections where they are conversing, but we, the audience, are left wondering what they're talking about. For me, this derails the action of the play, the same way it would have if the Ghost had been delivering his lines in, say, Danish. I think this choice is hyper-politically correct, and they've done this in other plays, again with Mr. Seago. The worst was in Our Town last year, where everything stopped dead when Seago had lines to deliver.
But that was the only failing in an otherwise terrific performance. The fatuous king, his queen (whose motivation seemed unclear here), and a terrific trio of Polonius and his kids. His famous lecture to them before Laertes goes back to college ("Neither a borrower nor a lender be...") was moving and funny. Just before Laertes can escape, his loquatious father has yet one more thing to say. His words of advice are well known to the kids; they recite it with him in perfect teenage exasperation. Richard Elmore, who has "bluster" down pat, has found a perfect role in Polonius. More surprising was Susannah Flood as Ophelia: energetic, bright, and lots of fun, unlike your typical spaced-out depressive, so that when she does her mad scene, standing on chairs, removing bits of clothing, we are as astonished as the family.
Hamlet has all the best lines, of course. Donohue makes the most of the wit and sarcasm. I'd forgotten how funny this part of the play can be, with barbs and puns a-flying. And no one can deliver those lines better than Donohue. The physical part of his acting is also flawless and inspiring at the same time. Although this portrayal is unlike any I'd seen before, it seemed so natural that I can't imagine it being in any other way. I'd seen Hamlet done here years ago, and all I remember was that it seemed interminable and I couldn't wait for it to end. To be fair, that performace was in the outdoor theater, and they may have not cut as much, if any, from the script as they did here (two small scenes, I heard); also, I may have been cold. This Hamlet was in the chronically over-air-conditioned but otherwise comfortable Bowmer Theater. (In the sweltering heat of Ashland in August, you see crowds in shorts, T-shirts, and sandals, but many of them are carrying coats that they will don for the theaters.)
I came up to Ashland back in February and saw this Hamlet (you can't see this production too many times), Pride and Prejudice (which I saw again this time), and A Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, in which Act II is the long dialog between Brick and Big Daddy. The scenes in Brick and Maggy's bedroom, especially the opening where Brick starts out in the shower, may have been the most visually arresting, but it was the argument of Act II that made this piece truly memorable. Two actors, Danforth Cummins as the hunky, broken son, and Michael Winters as the angry, blustery father who loves him, made you forget the fancy set. It's for moments like this, and almost any scene with Dan Donohue, that we come to Ashland, year after year.
(Here's the rest of the schedule. I hope to have time to add comments about these, too.)
Wednesday night, at the Elizabethan Theater:
The Merchant of Venice.
Thursday matinee, at the New Theater.
Ruined.
Thursday evening, at the Bowmer Theater:
Throne of Blood.
Friday matinee, at the Bowmer.
Pride and Prejudice.
Friday evening, at the Bowmer:
She Loves Me (a musical).
Saturday matinee, at the New Theater:
American Night.
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