TThe Globe Theater is often criticized for tampering with tradition, but here are Shakespeare’s plays about love, deceit, male celibacy and female purity that should please purists. . The comedy is delivered straight, so to speak, with Elizabethan costumes containing the piece’s biggest surprise element.
The masquerade ball, in which the disguised Don Pedro (Ryan Donaldson) woos Hero (Lydia Fleming) on Claudio’s behalf, is a sight to behold. Featuring elaborate and exquisite animal-themed beaks, manes and wings, it’s as if his enchanting and surreal 16th century fantasy has come to life.
But there’s nothing stuffy about Sean Holmes’ work, which feels light and modern despite its traditional carapace. There are also Elizabethan dances, which bring the magic of the era along with the costumes, but the moves outside of the dance choreography are not very original.
The war is over, a lovely warm summer euphoria wafts from the set, a Mediterranean orange tree climbs the back wall of Grace Smart’s stage design, and the characters pick up large baskets of oranges strewn about. It is sometimes eaten with the skin peeled.
There is also enchanting music using instruments such as guitar, accordion, percussion, and mandolin. This musicality stands out between scenes, adding a cheeky flourish to comedy and action with arching sounds that inflate moments (of tension, romance, intrigue, etc.) like silent film music.
The comical interactions between the quick-witted, enthusiastic Beatrice, played by Amalia Vitale, and the endearingly pompous Benedick, played by Echo Quarti, are an entertaining highlight. Their intense love-hate chemistry never completely dissipates, but by the end you feel the tenderness of their union.
There’s a more obvious lack of synergy between the central lovers, Hero and Claudio (Adam Wadsworth), and their romance feels vague. This removes the shock of Claudio’s rejection of Hero, and lends the play’s uneasy mixture of comedy and tragedy an even greater cacophony. There’s not enough of a drop in tone beyond the aborted wedding, and it continues to feel like a comedy with added screaming, rather than something more textured.
The comedy is in primary colors, not delicately squeezed out of the dialogue, and is broadly acted, approaching the spirit of a clown pantomime, as Benedick is tricked into an awkward love affair with Beatrice. There’s not much original physical comedy in the scene with the seagulls getting caught up in it. That may be true, but it’s not surprising, it’s solid.
The pacing also suffers, with the comedy becoming monotonous in the second act, and even though the play is over two and a half hours long, there is too much plot and not enough time. But the tense humor of Dogberry (Johnny Broadbent) and his friends is thankfully brief, and the whole film is brought together with enthusiasm.
All in all, it’s fun summer food with most of the gloom melting away, and the problematic drama bubbling up into something fun.
