Photo by Jenn Udoni
Late in the play As You Like It, the main character Rosalind tells many other characters, “I can do strange things.” Specifically, she is about to reveal that she has been masquerading as the male Ganymede and, through a complicated group of agreements, that revelation will create a domino effect that will result in several marriages beyond her own. But Shakespeare’s Forest of Arden, also, can do strange things: its almost supernatural combination of peace and empathetic connections among people and even nature transforms those who live there into far less restricted versions of the people they were in the court.
This musical adaptation by Tony-winning author and composer Shaina Taub (Suffs) and Laurie Woollery is directed by Braden Abraham, who made the compelling decision to set the play’s two major locations within 1920s Chicago: the court is a version of a 1920s speakeasy, while the forest itself is the Illinois Prairie. It’s not so much a “forest” as we think of them as a forest the way Elizabethans did: a natural location containing trees, caves, and open meadows where anything might happen. In Shakespeare, such forests are very often magical. (Think of the fairies in A Midsummer Night’s Dream.) Scenic designers Sara Ryung Clement and Jacelyn Stewart have created wonderful settings that allow Abraham and his cast to play and explore both the strict court and the more colorful, freer forest. The monochromatic speakeasy is all straight lines and secretive, dimmer lighting courtesy of Eric Southern and Daphne Agosin, while the forest is awash in bright color and whimsy without a straight line in sight: even the trees are beautifully askew.
Taub and Woolery have judiciously cut the play, making many scenes shorter and combining others, as well as replacing sections with songs that often incorporate Shakespeare’s phrases and lines but mostly sound like much more modern pieces. The play now opens with the melancholy character Jacques (a bit less melancholy as portrayed by the introspective Matthew C. Yee) singing a lovely adaptation of the “All the world’s a stage” soliloquy, setting us all up for the way this show is going to work. (Jacques spends much of the play trying to compose that song, which I guess makes the entire thing a kind of flashback. That works fine, as the shortened play perforce seems to condense time. It’s a fast-paced two hours with no intermission.)
The main lovers, Rosalind (a transcendent Phoebe González) and Orlando (exuberantly played by Benjamin Matthew) are exquisite from their meet-cute after a wrestling match through to their wedding in the forest. They manage to make you believe in the power of love at first sight, as does another major couple: Celia, Rosalind’s cousin and best friend (Andrea San Miguel) and the reformed evil sibling of Orlando, Oliver (Anand Nagraj). A third couple, the sarcastic Phoebe (Dakota Hughes) and the love-struck Sylvia (Grace Steckler), travel a different road, as Phoebe first wants nothing to do with Sylvia’s advances. There is also a fourth couple, the never-serious clown Touchstone, played by Jackson Evans, and the unassuming William, played by Elliott Esquivel. Maybe they manage to love each other truly, but it’s hard to see anything authentically emotional coming from Touchstone. He even asks the cleric marrying them whether she is truly an officiant, as a less-than-official wedding would make it easier to leave his husband later on.
All of this silliness (and it is often very, very silly and funny indeed) happens because the old Duke (Paul Oakley Stovall) has had his crown usurped by his younger brother Frederick (Scott Aiello). Frederick has banished his brother and members of his court to Arden, where the former courtiers have discovered a more laid-back lifestyle as they remove themselves from the society and learn the value of living simply. When he becomes neurotically convinced that Rosalind, who he had allowed to remain, is actively trying to undermine him, he banishes her as well, leading to a serious exodus that includes not only her but his daughter (Celia) and his clown (Touchstone) as well as others.
As befits a Shakespearean comedy, the plot here is ambitious, full of twists, and quite often just plain frivolous. A lot of it depends upon Rosalind successfully pretending to be a man in order to be safe in the forest, chancing upon the man she loves there and teaching him how to woo the woman she truly is by pretending to be herself. (It’s a Victor/Victoria thing: a woman pretending to be a man pretending to be a woman.) González has great fun with it, as does Matthew’s Oliver, who (as is always the case in Shakespeare) totally accepts the disguise despite its absurdity.
The songs (performed by the cast along with a lively onstage band) are excellent, as are the singing voices of the cast members, and they add emotional depth even to some of the more ridiculous moments. This is an absolutely stellar addition to the pantheon of musical Shakespeare adaptations.
As You Like It, presented by Writers Theatre in Glencoe, is highly recommended. Performances are scheduled to run until December 14. For more information and to purchase tickets, visit www.writerstheatre.org.