A Midsummer Night’s Dream in Spring Green

Shakespeare’s mot popular plays are perhaps the trickiest to bring to the stage. A play with instant name recognition that A Midsummer Night’s Dream comes to any stage with an immense amount of cultural baggage. The trick is to present the play in a way that is novel enough to seem fresh, yet reverent enough to the source material to satisfy purists. The American Players Theatre production asserts its individuality the moment one sits down in the APT’s somewhat vast outdoor theatre. Todd Rosenthal’s set looks distinctly modern, featuring a winding ramp and a port-a-potty. Actors in costume as somewhat contemporary Greek stagehands mill about apparently going about the sorts of business that stagehands normally attend to prior to a show.

Yes, this is a contemporary staging of Shakespeare’s classic complete with actors delivering lines in a distinctly contemporary style, but this need not turn away purists. The cast at the APT does remarkable job of making some of Shakespeare’s most beautiful lines sound perfectly natural and intelligible to anyone regardless of their level of experience with late sixteenth century verse. In a brilliantly understated performance, James Ridge plays Egeus, an upper class gentleman who wishes that his beautiful daughter Hermia (a remarkably poised Tiffany Scott cleverly dressed to look like a contemporary wealthy, Greek shipping heiress or some such) wed a reasonably nice young man named Demetrius (Steve Haggard, who puts in a suitably awkward performance. Dressed to look like a contemporary geek, he s seen at one point taking a few puffs from an asthma inhaler.) As such things usually go in Shakespeare, Hermia is, of course, completely against marrying Demetrius, as she is completely in love with the much more rugged and masculine Lysander (Matt Scwader.) Schwader is particularly interesting in the role of the slightly thick Mesomorphic uber-guy. He delivers lines with a sharp stupidity that’s almost imperceptible. Though Hermia is quite clearly in love with Lysander, Demetrius is determined to win her over, oblivious as he is to the fawning attentions of another girl named Helena (Carrie A. Coon.) The clever contemporary translation of characters is particularly appealing with respect to Helena, shown here as a mid-90’s pseudo-bohemian a la Alanis Morissette. She is shown at one point carrying an acoustic guitar in a black case adorned with quasi-political stickers. Cute.

Of course, things get complicated when the fairy kingdom gets involved. In keeping with the contemporary feel of things, Fairy costuming is simple and modern with clean lines and tastefully mild hints of the supernatural. Michae Huftile look positively regal in the role of fairy king Oberon . . . bedecked in a costume that seems more inspired by traditional Wiccan imagery than the senselessly ornate images of the fairy kingdom given in popular culture. Much of the rest of Rachel Healy’s costuming follows this spirit and performances seem to follow in a similarly naturalistic style. This doesn’t always serve to give fairies the kind of dreamlike quality that the script is so eager to grant them, but there are moments when things seem positively surreal, and that’s what’s really important here. Of prticular note here is Jonathan Smoots in the role of the weaver Bottom, whose head is transformed into that of an ass for reasons that will go unnamed here. Smoots’ performance here is the kind of comic relief that rounds out the edges of an otherwise uneven production, ensuring that everything feels more or les satisfying as the production awakens at play’s end.

The American Player’s Theatre’s production of A Midsummer Night’s Dream runs through October 5th in Spring Green. For more information call the Box Office at 608-588-2361 or visit the APT online at http://www.playinthewoods.org

Ryan was born and raised in Milwaukee, but never fully understood how wonderfully cool a city it is until she started working with Vital. Now she's an art scene devotee, and she's loving every minute of it.