Play on!

And Some Find Greatness
Between the Lines

William Shakespeare and Duke Ellington were collaborating long before Sheldon Epps and Cheryl L. West brought them together for Play On!, a musical about a love triangle involving a Duke, a regal Lady, and a woman disguised as a man as their go-between messenger. The musical transplants Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night to the Harlem Renaissance (1920s–1930s) with a score comprising Ellington tunes, andin the hands of director Lili-Anne Brown and the feet, legs, and voices—oh! the voices—of the cast performing the musical at Signature Theatre in Arlington, Virginia, recently closed out a mostly sold-out run last weekend. Maybe for Shakespeare purists it won’t mean a thing if it ain’t Bard writing, but aside from being fun stuff and great Ellington music, Play On! captures and even enhances some of the universal humanism Twelfth Night explores. For the complete review, click here.

With sidebar:

Such Sweet Thunder

The Duke Finds Kindred Spirit in The Bard

In 1956, the four-year-old Stratford, Canada, Shakespeare Festival invited Duke Ellington and his orchestra to perform a series of concerts. Ellington's interaction with the festival's Shakespeare practitioners inspired him and his orchestrator, Billy Strayhorn, to compose "Such Sweet Thunder," a suite of 12 songs based on Shakespeare's characters and the Bard himself. Ellington premiered the piece the following year. Ellington certainly knew Shakespeare, based on his insights in literally playing the playwright's characters. For the full review, click here.

Merry Wives

Today's Merry Wives; a Timeless Falstaff

It plays like the premiere of a new reality series franchise. Merry Wives (of Harlem) stars Anne Page, Johnny Falstaff, and the merry wives, Madam Nkechi Ford and Madam Ekue Page, streaming now at the Shakespeare Theatre Company's Harman Hall in Washington, D.C. Sounds ridiculous? So is the play it's built on, William Shakespeare's The Merry Wive's of Windsor. As adaptations of Shakespeare’s works go, Jocelyn Bioh’s is one of the most thoroughly Shakespearean transfers to the 21st century I've seen of any of the Bard’s 16th century plays. A big reason: Shakespeare’s great comic creation, Sir John Falstaff, gets a thoroughly modern rendition in the performance of Jacob Ming-Trent, destined to be one of the most indelible Falstaff's romping through my memories to the end of my time on this earth. For the full review, click here.

THE COMEDY OF ERRORS

Blackfriars Vet Brews Brilliant Circe’s Cup

Chris Johnston, always a great musician and evolving actor in the time I saw him in American Shakespeare Center productions at the Blackfriars Playhouse from 2011 to 2019, returned to the Blackfriars as director of William Shakespeare’s The Comedy of Errors during this year’s spring season. In that role he helmed a production that proved to be every bit a reflection of the multitalented actor himself, delivering Shakespeare’s multidimensional text and crazier than crazy plot with juxtapositions of clowning and emotional breadth, slapstick and psychological depth, textual purity and meta magic. Provided a company of superior physical, textual, and character acting skills and musical talent, Johnston’s Blackfriars Playhouse directorial debut captured a decade of his own theatrical brilliance in two-hours traffic on the stage he had plied so well. For the full review, click here.

KING LEAR

A Grade A (Minus) King Lear

It's rare seeing so much joy—appreciation, yes; joy, no—after a performance of William Shakespeare's King Lear, especially after sobs floated through the Blackhouse Playhouse in Staunton, Viginia, just minutes before. This ovation, though, not only recognized the exquisite presentation of Shakespeare's richly drawn characters we had just seen; it also was visceral expression of what a member of the American Shakespeare Center's staff told me in the lobby before the show: "We're back!" For the full review, click here.

All the Devils are Here:
How Shakespeare Invented the Villain

Staring Into the True Face of Evil

A black chair sits in the corner of our basement. Made of wood with cushioned seat and back, it is starkly simple, narrow and tall. It looks like an ancient throne because it was, truly, Macbeth's throne; it even has knife slashes in the back cushion where Macbeth stabbed at his late best buddy, Banquo, tearing through his throne's vinyl cushion and cracking its wood frame. That's how much Patrick Page was into Macbeth when he played the titular part in the Shakespeare Theatre Company's 2004 production. That throne my wife and I purchased at a props and costumes sale is not the only connection I have with Page and Macbeth, as revealed in Page's one-actor show, All the Devils are Here: How Shakespeare Invented the Villain. The subtitle for Page's own play is instructive to his 90-minute show's substance. In a tour de force repertoire of performances featuring a canon's worth of villains, Page demonstrates how Shakespeare turned a stock theatrical character into real people. People like us. For the complete review, click here.

King Lear

The Eyes Have It

Somewhere in this mess of a house I live in hides my folder for the 2023 Shakespeare Theatre Company's production of William Shakespeare's King Lear starring Patrick Page in the title role. The folder contains, most importantly, my notes from the two performances I attended at the Klein Theatre: on opening night, sitting about ten rows back and to the far left; and three weeks later in my season subscription seats in the center of the fourth row. I can't reasonably write a full review of the Simon Godwin-helmed production without those notes. Relying on my memory is bound to lead to inaccurate reporting. However, some moments of Page's performance are seared indelibly into my brain: first, a scene in which he played me; last, a scene in which he played my wife, Sarah, who has Alzheimer's and now resides in a memory care center; and between those, a scene in which he played both Sarah and me.For the full review, click here.

The Complete Works of William Shakespeare
(Abridged) [Revised] (Again)

Completing Shakespeare’s
Complete Works At Last (Again)

You’ve not seen all of Shakespeare until you’ve seen the Complete Works of William Shakespeare. That’s a rule I’ve derived from the times I mention seeing a Shakespeare play and oh-so-subtly brag that I've seen all 42 plays connected to Shakespeare’s pen. The reply I inevitably get is, “Have you seen The Complete Works of William Shakespeare (Abridged)?” referring to the winking, satirical spin on the Bard’s works by Adam Long, Daniel Singer, and Jess Winfield of the Reduced Shakespeare Company. Well, I’ve finally seen it, the Again version, at the American Shakespeare Center’s Blackfriars Playhouse in Staunton, Virginia, a venue perfect for such a semi-improvisational, audience-participation show. Furthermore, the cast comprised three of my favorite Shakespeareans. To read the full review, click here.

Shakespeare News

Epic Shakespeare's Histories Enterprise
Resurrected as You Tube Audio Production

Brave Spirits Theatre's ambitious staging of Shakespeare's eight-play War of the Roses history cycle—interrupted by Covid and the theater's subsequent closure—has been resurrected as an online audio production. Artistic Director Charlene V. Smith, who put years of creative effort into her Shakespeare's Histories enterprise, never gave up on bringing it to full fruition and created audio performances with much of the original casts. The productions will be streamed in 24 episodes for free on You Tube. For details, click here.

The Comedy of Errors

Pair of Deuces, 3 of Hearts Equals a Winning Hand

Dromio prances onto the stage and launches into a high-kicking, body-twisting, hand-raising, disco-flavored song and dance. They are soon joined by the entire cast for a full-on dance number to conclude the Shakespeare Theatre Company's production of William Shakespeare's The Comedy of Errors. Foremost in my mind watching this finale is not the great production values of the show I'd just experienced, or the succinctly subtle acting choices across the talented ensemble, or the out-of-nowhere humor working in tandem with on-target Shakespearean verse readings. What I'm thinking is how the heck are Alex Brightman and David Fynn as, respectively, Dromio of Syracuse and Dromio of Ephesus still standing, let alone singing while dancing, given what they've accomplished physically and endured choreographically over the past 2:10 hour's traffic on the stage with only a 15-minute rest for intermission? To read the full review, click here.

Venus and Adonis

An Elizabethan Peep Show

Taffety Punk Theatre Company is a small but brightly shining gem in the Washington, D.C., theater scene, a richly talented acting company displaying a brilliantly inventive willingness to explore conceptual stagings of William Shakespeare’s works. This includes those narrative poems at the back of your edition of Shakespeare's Complete Works. Having staged The Rape of Lucrece in 2012, they have now undertaken Venus and Adonis, which could well have been Elizabethan porn. The two narrators, Tonya Beckman and Lise Bruneau, gave Shakespeare's vividly descriptive verses a cheeky resonance. For the review, click here.