As
one watches the first act of the Judith Shakespeare Company’s
wondrous production of The Tempest you think, ‘Of course! This
is how Shakespeare would have written this if he had been just a little
more enlightened!
For
Judith Shakespeare’s Prospero is a woman, played by the remarkable
Jane Titus. Other minor characters, such as the drunken sot Trinculo
and Sebastian, the conniving sister of King Alonso of Naples, are
also played by women, but Titus in the lead role gives the play a
new dimension that feels completely right
Instead
of a story about a curmudgeonly, shipwrecked male magician, we have
a contemplation of maternal love and sacrifice, the female relationship
to powers of nature and patriarchal resentment of it.
The
rightness has much to do with the familiar storyline. Prospero, the
Duke of Milan, (and she’s the Duke in her own right, not the
Duchess) has her dukedom stolen by her brother Antonio, as so many
women have had their own inheritance usurped, often by force of law
and custom, by their brothers.
Prospero
is banished with her daughter Miranda to wash ashore on an island
populated by spirits and other strange folk who Prospero learns to
control with the help of natural magic. When she gets word that a
wedding party containing the King, her perfidious brother and their
henchmen and women is on its way back from the nuptials of the King’s
daughter, Prospero causes a tempest to shipwreck them on her island,
which leads to Miranda falling in love with Ferdinand, the King’s
son, and other complications.
The
Tempest, Shakespeare’s last play, is such a work of genius that
it’s difficult to wreck if it’s done even half way decently,
but this production, under the joyous and energetic direction of Joanne
Zipay, excels in making more out of less. The sprites and naiads arrive
wearing glimmery gowns and ripple long silken sheets to represent
a storm-tossed ocean. The set, designed by Luke Cantarella, is a jumble
of angled wooden platforms that stands in for a beach. The illusion
is perfected by Joel Moritz’ warm golden lightning design.
The
costumes are wonderfully imagined. The island's goddesses, of all
sizes, shapes and colors, are draped in gossamer decorated with grape
bunches. Prospero’s magic cloak, worn over linen breeches and
camisole, is made of rags but still carries an aura of power. In contrast
to the simple clothing of Prospero and Miranda and the floaty stuff
worn by the spirits, the King of Naples and his people show up in
Italian suits, and bearing palm pilots. One has the feeling that designer
One Choi had great fun thinking up all these costumes.
Each
of the actors is amazing. Dacyl Acevedo’s Ariel brings the expected
physical delicacy to the role, but also gives the sprite a canny mind
and resonant, confident voice. Antonio del Rosario is a sinewy, seaweed
draped Caliban, more buffoonish than grotesque. In this reading of
the play the story of him and his mother, the witch Sycorax, becomes
an interesting parallel to the story of Prospero and Miranda. Instead
of being a pair of completely unnatural semi-demons, Caliban and the
unseen Sycorax, who also had great powers at her command, can be seen
as the obverse of the fierce but loving Prospero and the innocent
Miranda.
Indeed,
this Prospero, though the sight of Caliban is a bit off putting to
her, still sees him as something of a foster child. When she learns
that he’s trying to assassinate her she seems more hurt and
bemused than angry. In a parallel plotline, when the King’s
party begins to believe that Ferdinand has drowned, Ivanna Cullinan’s
sarcastic Sebastian, dressed in mannish clothes, begins to get it
in her head that she might become the new heir of Naples, and conspires
with Peter Zazzali’s lizardlike Antonio to do away with her
brother.
Of
course, to do this they both have to dismiss the legitimate claims
of the King’s daughter -- another woman about to be disinherited!
In this production Antonio also woos Sebastian with the long range
goal of one day marrying her when she takes over Naples, then usurping
her power as he’s usurped his sister’s. Suzanne Hayes
is fabulously hysterical and screechy as Trinculo, with her lovely
Wicked Witch of the West cackle and explosion of crinkly red hair.
The
tradition these days is to play her fellow drunk Stephano over-the-top
campy and Michael Shattner certainly does -- he’s hilarious.
Hilary Ward’s lovely Miranda and Steven Fales’ hunky,
bright-eyed Ferdinand can’t help but be a bit teeth achingly
callow. Perhaps even 17th century audiences couldn’t hear “The
white cold virgin snow upon my heart/Abates the ardor of my liver,”
without snickering, but if modern audiences can’t quite identify
with such innocence, it’s our loss.
Finally,
Jane Titus is magnificent. Her Prospero is a crotchety, loving, tolerant
earth mother, at ease with her power but responsible with it; she
doesn’t kill her enemies in the shipwreck, and the worse punishment
she tends to inflict upon disobedient servants are cramps and pinches.
The look in her eyes as she watches her daughter fall for the son
of her enemy speaks volumes of the depth of her love.
The
pageant she calls forth to celebrate their engagement is a moiety
of goddesses: Juno, Iris, Ceres, and Persephone, the daughter Ceres
also had to give up to an enemy of sorts. When Prospero relinquishes
her supernatural powers for the inferior temporal powers that come
from her restoration as the Duke and puts on a suit and sensible shoes
we’re a bit sad, as is Ariel when she’s at last given
her longed for freedom.
Why
would Prospero give up the power to command the wind and the sea and
creatures of the land and the air and weird spirits? The answer is,
it’s simply time, as Shakespeare himself believed it was time
to put aside the “rough magic,” of playwrighting and return
to Stratford.
The
Tempest is one of those Off Broadway treasures that makes the big,
splashy stuff on Broadway look stale, as well as ridiculously pricey.
It will be at Theatre 3, 311 West 43rd Street, till May 20.