A Midsummer Night's Dream: Comedy. By William Shakespeare. Directed by Tim Supple. Curran Theatre, 445 Geary St., San Francisco. (415)512-7770 or go to www.shnsf.com. Through June 1, 2008.
A DEVILISH PUCK AND RAUNCHY BOTTOM
Multilingualism is the de rigueur in present day world and we herald the concept of “one world” but it is a concept and not an actuality. In the Asian continent of India, there are seven diverse distinctive ethnic groups with separate languages. When The British Council in India and Sri Lanka commissioned Tim Supple to create and direct a new touring theater production, he selected Shakespeare’s “A Mid Summer Night’s Dream.” Supple is an innovator with a string of honors to show for his innovation. An Indian/Sri Lankan production reeks of innovation, artistic license and multilingualism. Along with English, Hindi and Bengali the actors perform and speak in their own languages. The show has had great success touring India and received praise on tour in Great Britain and Italy. This Best of Broadway production is its North American premiere and considering that about one half of the audience did not return for the second act suggests a less than successful run in North America.
“Mid Summer Night’s Dream” is a mythical play that transports us, as we suspend belief, from the mortal world of Athens to a fairy tale world of passion under a full moon where love blossoms, confusion reigns until a semblance of sanity is restored. Those who know the play and the ramifications of the twisted plot may well be pleased with seeing a production full of energy, visual beauty and atmospheric music played on wholly Indian instruments. Those who are not familiar with the plot will be confused and have to be content with a diminutive, impish and devilish Puck (Ajay Kumar), as master of ceremonies, providing humor in league with a corpulent, well-endowed Bottom (Joy Fernandes), now half man-half donkey, cavorting with a lascivious Titania (P R Jijoy), Queen of the Fairies, in a sling/bed of red silk. Raunchy may be over reacting but bawdy is certainly appropriate to describe the actions of all the lovers including Lysander (Chandan Roy Sanyal) ,Hermia (Yuki Ellias), Demtrius (Prassanna Mahagamage) and Helena (Shanaya Rafaat). Too occasionally, we are treated with one of Shakespeare’s line in English such as, “What fools we mortals be.”
The staging and performing are eye popping as the 23 cast members climb and descend on silk ropes, engage in martial arts, dance up a storm and clamber up and down a bamboo framework covered with white silk sections that are eventually removed to reveal the bare framework. Those who left at intermission missed a second act that included a ubiquitous Bollywood dance production number well worth seeing. Overall, Shakespeare is not well served but the totality of the production is worth a look-see. Running time two hours and 30 minutes with intermission.
Courtesy of TheatreWorld Internet Magazine
