Ever since I was old enough to understand what it meant, seeing the Confederate battle flag on display has made me squirm—and the fact that it continues to fly over state houses in the Deep South makes me genuinely angry. That said, I’m also not fond of “debates” driven by self-righteousness, of which vast amounts have been evident on both sides of this particular fence. Nor do I usually think it wise to take action on anything in the heat of the moment, which is, needless to say, what’s happening right now.
But it’s also true that America is a country in which things tend to get done either in the midst of a crisis or (more often) not at all….
In today’s Wall Street Journal, I review the Hudson Valley Shakespeare Festival’s new production of The Tempest. Here’s an excerpt.
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None of Shakespeare’s plays is better suited to outdoor staging than “The Tempest,” whose setting is an enchanted island, and it is hard to imagine a better place to see it than under the tent of the Hudson Valley Shakespeare Festival, pitched on a wooded bluff overlooking the Hudson River. There being few finer summer theater companies in America, I expected much of Ryan Quinn’s new production, and I got all I hoped for: This was a “Tempest” that gave pleasure of every conceivable kind, one in which Shakespeare’s tale of forgiveness and redemption is retold in such a way as to give like delight to those who know the play well and those who are seeing it for the first time….
Mr. Quinn’s “Tempest” is characteristic of the HVSF’s now-familiar “house style.” Utterly straightforward, with no obscuring high directorial concept superimposed on Shakespeare’s text, it is played out on a plain dirt stage floor devoid of sets and, for the most part, props, with pop-style dancing (skillfully choreographed by Susannah Millonzi) used to set the scene. The magical powers of the furious Prospero are brilliantly suggested by the sound design of Charles Coes and Nathan Roberts and the lighting of Lucrecia Briceno. All else is left to the actors, the text, and the viewer’s imagination….
My latest Wall Street Journal “Sightings” column is about the possible effects of vax-and-mask safety protocols on theater in America. Here’s an excerpt.
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Broadway’s theater owners and operators have announced that adults who want to go to a show must both show proof of Covid-19 vaccination before entering the theater and wear a mask throughout the performance (children under 12 can still get in with just a negative test). Not only are these double-barreled safety protocols being enforced at previews of “Pass Over,” which opens Aug. 22, but they are already emerging willy-nilly as a national standard, and I expect that they will ultimately be adopted by virtually every theater in the U.S., indoor and outdoor alike.
As I wrote in this space on Monday, I was forced to take a three-week hiatus from blogging because of overwork and technical problems. Now that I’m back again, I want to post links to the things I wrote and did elsewhere during my absence:
• In addition, Peter Marks, Elisabeth Vincentelli, and I released a new “Three on the Aisle” podcast about theater in America. Here’s the official summary:
This week, the critics talk about live theatre! They focus on productions outside of New York City, including Shakespeare & Company’s King Lear in the Berkshires, an upcoming Our Town by the Peterborough Players in New Hampshire, a performance of Come From Away on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial, and Elisabeth’s mysterious trip to Creede, Colo. We also discuss Broadway’s reopening schedule, the state of vaccination and variants, and Peter’s acclaimed college acting career.
• As I mentioned on “Three on the Aisle,” I’ve fallen in love with a wonderful woman named Cheril. It seemed appropriate to mention her on the podcast because we “met” as a result of her hearing me there last year. Cheril and I became close shortly after the first anniversary of Hilary’s death on March 31, and we now consider ourselves full-fledged romantic partners. Like Hilary, she is a private person, so I won’t say much more than that, but I did want all of you to know that we’re both profoundly happy.
