Twelfth Night - Shakespear In The Park — Page 7

0-1 on the virtual line for today. Will try again another day (and again and again).

I got on the line at around 10am this morning and got tickets, and it looked like a fair number of people behind me were going to get them too -- despite the fact that it was a so-called "limited distribution" performance.

I thought the production was very good; it works from beginning to end, milks much of the comedy from the story, and is carried along by swift direction and able performances. For me the MVP was Audra McDonald (is there anything she can't do?) who provided the most fiercely animate, entertaining and surprising Olivia I've ever seen...coolly stern one moment and deliciously giddy the next, and not a single line of the language was lost in her delivery.

The audience really ate up the scenes involving Hamish Linklater, Julie White, and Jay O. Sanders, who are all superb (particularly Linklater - pricelessly clueless as Aguecheek). They get the funniest scenes in the play and they more than do them justice. You miss them when they're offstage.

Anne Hathaway fits in just fine -- you never doubt she belongs there with the rest of them and she got her share of laughs -- but Viola is something of a thankless role amid the comic hijinks and emotive gymnastics that many of the other characters get to sink their teeth into. Ditto that for Orsino played by Raul Esparza, who all but disappears in Act Two until the end when you'd practically forgotten he was in the play altogether.

Michael Cumpsty's Malvolio is not the funniest nor the most moving one I've ever seen, but neither does he bore. David Pittu as Feste gets several tuneful and haunting songs, supported by a quintet of onstage musicians which are seamlessly integrated into the action.

The design of the production is rather simple -- we're in a pasture of rolling green hills -- and the attractive costumes suggest something like early 1800s.

Overall it may approach the material with little in the way of fresh ideas, but it is a very funny, very satisfying production of the play with little to complain about.

Updated On: 6/17/09 at 03:00 AM

It's suppose to be a gorgeous day today...I suspect the line will be nuts.

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"The audience really ate up the scenes involving Hamish Linklater, Julie White, and Jay O. Sanders, who are all superb (particularly Linklater - pricelessly clueless as Aguecheek). They get the funniest scenes in the play and they more than do them justice. You miss them when they're offstage."

Really dug this production, but these three gave by far the broadest performances of the ensemble, making this the "biggest" and silliest production of TWELFTH NIGHT I've seen. Still, what Linklater and Sanders were doing worked for the play, while White (who I generally love) confused the s**t out of me, in regards to what she was doing.

It's almost as if she realized she has a thankless part, so she played everything wiiiiildly over-the-top, shrieking everything as if she was still in TRANSFORMERS 2. The audience was laughing and applauding at everything she was doing because she was loud and "funny," but my whole group -- who were actually familiar with the source material -- just kept giving each other puzzled looks. Seriously misguided performance.

The highlights of the production for me were Audra McDonald (obviously) and David Pittu (taking a familiar "fool" part and imbuing it with warmth) -- both lighting up the stage whenever they appeared.

" Really dug this production, but these three gave by far the broadest performances of the ensemble, making this the "biggest" and silliest production of TWELFTH NIGHT I've seen. Still, what Linklater and Sanders were doing worked for the play, while White (who I generally love) confused the s**t out of me, in regards to what she was doing.

It's almost as if she realized she has a thankless part, so she played everything wiiiiildly over-the-top, shrieking everything as if she was still in TRANSFORMERS 2. The audience was laughing and applauding at everything she was doing because she was loud and "funny," but my whole group -- who were actually familiar with the source material -- just kept giving each other puzzled looks. Seriously misguided performance. "

I think this is overstating it a bit. The performances were certainly rowdy but broad they were not, at least in my judgement. They were interesting and specific throughout. Compared to some of the other things I've seen her in, I thought Julie White was pretty subdued. She was never shrill or excessive, at least at the performance I caught.

0-2 again. And today should be a splendid one weather-wise.
Enjoy, all you lucky virtual-liners and all who sat "like patience on a monument." (See, I know my 12th N!)

What time should I try the cancelation line for tonight?

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I got in line at 8:20am and got tickets almost in the back, but this definitely wasn't an insane situation the way it was when I did Hair. (That time I ended up going to lunch, coming back, and sitting in the standby line until 8 for a grand total of 8 hours of waiting. Good times.)

Anyway, now I'm sleepy so I'm just going to say I agree with Ryan4's review. And while I was there I kept thinking about how much Em must have enjoyed Esparza in his various costumes. :P

I realized that I never posted what I thought of the show. Briefly:

I'm a little conflicted. On one hand, this being the first time I'd seen Twelfth Night, I thought it was lovely. It's fun, I laughed a lot, and the whimsical sort of romance is definitely there. That much, I think Daniel Sullivan got just fine. I thought Audra was fantastic. Anne is adorable, and very natural, and sings quite well. I completely see why everyone is talking about Hamish Linklater. I also enjoyed David Pittu a lot, even if his casting was sort of obvious, really didn't mind Julie White, and adored the score. The music was definitely a highlight.

Yet on the other hand, I'm also disappointed with some of Sullivan's choices to play it so safe and by-the-book. Overall, I'd rather see something like this done by-the-book than under some crazy, weird, wacky concept just for concept's sake, but, while I do wish it had been a little sexier on the whole because it is in so many ways a play about lust, my big disappointment with this production actually comes with Orsino. And it's not because of Raul; I have wanted to see Raul perform Shakespeare since the very first time I saw him act. He has a way with language that is so perfectly suited for Shakespeare's writing. I have waited years for this -- and it was worth the wait. Not only is he doing Shakespeare, he's singing it; and I think he's doing beautifully with what he has. But, I feel like what he has isn't making use of what he'd be able to do with an otherwise rather thankless role. I wanted to see more conflict, more pining, more attraction coming from Orsino re: Cesario. But it seems like Sullivan really kept that very toned down, so, in the end when everyone finds out that Viola is a girl, it comes off as, "Oh, you're a girl? Well, I love you now!" as opposed to the idea of, "Oh, you're a girl? Okay, I love you. And it's okay for me to love you now" that I had expected. As it stands, Orsino's confession of love feels somewhat out of nowhere, and lacking in the depth I'd expected it would have. Raul did a handful of interviews where he talked about all of the sexuality confusion and gender identity issues in the play (that Time Out mixtape article, for example), so that led me to believe it would really play a big part in the show. Like I said, I hadn't seen or read the play before this, but based on various synopses and said interviews, I had just assumed that Orsino being in love with what he believes to be a man was going to play a fairly large part in his arc, and instead felt we didn't really see enough of it. I'm usually a big fan of Sullivan's work -- and I know he can do controversial. So I'm not really sure what's up here. But I feel like he has an opportunity to DO something with this role that's generally seen as useless and unforgiving, and an actor who can handle the task, and he's not making good on it.

So, I don't know. That may be terribly naive and off-base to people more finely versed in Shakespeare than I am, but there you have it. All of that being said, on the whole, I do think it's immensely enjoyable and will be going back at least once more.

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Updated On: 6/18/09 at 10:51 AM

Oh, yeah, hearing him take on that language was beautiful. He's got such a knack for interpreting linguistically rich writing, and that much totally exceeded my expectations. He hasn't done Shakespeare in 15 years or something, but I hope he'll do more of it in the future.

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Was the performance rained out tonight?

Nope, not rained out tonight. It played to a house not much more than half full, though (they moved people from the sides to the middle). They paused for about a 5-10 minute rain delay, and the performance ended at 11:05pm (which was actually earlier than the first show ended, which did not have a rain delay). I was glad I went! It was just as enjoyable as the first time I saw it. And the last song (I forget what it's called, but it's something about rain) got a great reception.