Commands Both Martial and Marital

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/08/20/theater/stratford-shakespeare-festival-henry-v-and-cymbeline.html

Version 0 of 1.

STRATFORD, Ontario — One of the signal pleasures of attending the Stratford Shakespeare Festival here is the opportunity it affords to sample the breadth and depth of Shakespeare’s work in just a few days: a history play on Wednesday, a comedy on Thursday, a late romance on Friday. To survey Shakespeare’s plays in such proximity is sometimes to be reminded how unsatisfying — or at least how limiting — these traditional classifications can be.

History, in Shakespeare, does not preclude generous doses of comedy. While kings and courtiers are wrestling with the fate of a country and the responsibilities of power, Shakespeare is always reminding us that the reeling comedy of daily life goes on in the background. In “Henry V,” seen this season in a rousing production directed by Des McAnuff, the foreground may be given over to the patriotic pageant of the title character’s triumphant invasion of France, but a comedy playing in counterpoint depicts the base motives of lesser mortals.

Shakespeare’s sunlit comedies are almost always dappled with shadow. Most end in marriage, but the paths to these satisfying pairings often skirt tragedy. “Much Ado About Nothing,” presented here in a sparkling production directed by Christopher Newton set in Brazil in roughly the late 19th century, is most cherished for the verbal sparring of the Beatrice and Benedick, the prototypical unlikely bedmates of romantic comedy. But in the secondary romance evil almost outmatches good as the conniving Don John attempts to thwart the happy union of the ingénue Hero and her devoted lover, Claudio.

The woolly romance “Cymbeline,” here expertly directed by Antoni Cimolino, often feels like a madcap mash-up of Shakespearean elements. Once again, as in “Henry V,” a small band of determined Englishmen overmatched by opposing forces — this time Romans — emerge miraculously triumphant. And, as in “Much Ado,” a nefarious character plots to thwart a rapturous young romance, for no particular reason other than general malignity.

This season’s Shakespearean lineup also affords audiences the chance to see productions from the company’s outgoing artistic director and its incoming one. Mr. McAnuff, who has headed the festival for the last five seasons, next year hands the reins to Mr. Cimolino, the company’s general director. Happily no invidious comparisons are necessary. “Henry V” is one of the finest Shakespeare productions from Mr. McAnuff that I’ve seen in my visits here, and Mr. Cimolino’s “Cymbeline” portends good things for his stewardship of the all-important Shakespeare canon.

Mr. McAnuff’s taste for the bold and the bright has on occasion led him astray. (His garishly busy production of “Guys and Dolls” on Broadway was a major misfire.) But his sweeping, majestic “Henry V” takes smart advantage of the wonderful Festival Theater, with the French and British armies trooping up and down the aisles. A modern-dress prologue gives way to traditional period costumes, and Robert Brill’s stark but imposing set designs are perfectly integrated with the festival stage. The fluidity and simplicity of the production also honors Shakespeare’s oft-repeated invitations to the audience to allow the imagination to people the stage with clashing armies and flit from Britain to France and back again in the blink of an eye.

The most famous passages in “Henry V” belong to the title character, here played by Aaron Krohn: the ringing calls to arms (“Once more unto the breach”) during the siege of Harfleur and the enduring paean to the small “band of brothers” seemingly outmatched by the French at Agincourt. But the play’s wide-angle view of the British at war includes almost a dozen choice roles and is thus an ideal vehicle to display the depth of talent in Stratford’s repertory company.

The roistering comedy of the lower orders is pungently delivered. Randy Hughson is marvelously ripe as the shiftless Bardolph, whose stealing of a chalice from a church marks the point at which Henry must definitively turn his back on his past, allowing his onetime friend to be hanged. Tom Rooney is equally fine as the dogged survivor Pistol, who emerges unchanged despite enduring humiliation at the hands of the Welsh captain Fluellen, vowing “to England will I steal, and there I’ll steal.” Ben Carlson’s surly but loyal Fluellen is also a standout, although his thick accent sounded — bizarrely — more Indian than Welsh to my ears.

Mr. Krohn cuts a dashing, dignified figure as the warring Henry, but his performance doesn’t transmit much sense of the character’s interior life, which is a necessity if “Henry V” is going to come across as more than a vivid historical pageant. Too much of the famous oratory comes across as eloquent but hollow, as if the king were speaking directly to posterity and not to the men before him. Mr. Krohn does, however, render Henry’s courtship of the French princess (Bethany Jillard) with appealing wit and charm, so his performance concludes on a ringing high note.

A sustained sense of boisterous humor pervades Mr. Newton’s production of “Much Ado,” which features Mr. Carlson, a festival mainstay, as a superb Benedick opposite the equally terrific Beatrice of Deborah Hay. They are, incidentally, a couple in real life, which may or may not lend their give and take an extra tug of feeling even in the early sequences when they sharpen their wits on each other with undisguised glee.

Ms. Hay’s Beatrice exudes a fluttery, slightly nervous energy that gives the character a touching vulnerability, but she is a deliciously unfettered comedian too. The stylish set, by Santo Loquasto, is dominated by a sinuous marble staircase. The biggest laugh in the production comes when a startled Beatrice, overhearing the staggering news that Benedick secretly adores her, performs a hilarious pratfall — a spot-on image of love’s ability to make even the steadiest minds lose their footing in the rush of new feeling.

“Cymbeline,” once considered a problematic play, has in the last decade or so emerged as a regular staple of the Shakespeare canon, appearing on major stages almost as often — if not more often — than the traditional favorites. The play’s contrasting textures and bizarreries — a sleeping potion! a headless corpse! — seem to appeal to directors, who often play up the absurdity with abandon. Mr. Cimolino’s strongly cast, traditional-dress staging is notably free of gimmickry. The director trusts his actors to lead us confidently through the strange thickets of the somewhat overburdened plot.

There are virtually no weak or disappointing performances here. As the wronged heroine Innogen, Cara Ricketts brings a vibrant emotional focus to the production, combining a strong will — and a tart tongue — with a moving ardor in her love for Posthumus, played by Graham Abbey with a matching sense of fierce devotion. The villainous Iachimo, who tricks Posthumus into believing Innogen has betrayed him, is portrayed by Tom McCamus with a rich oiliness; his silky, sinister voice itself has a hypnotic quality that’s well suited to the role of this wily would-be seducer.

With his mouth permanently agape, Mike Shara’s nefarious Cloten is repellently doltish, taking sniggering delight in his own lasciviousness. And as is often the case at Stratford, some of the most memorable performances come in small roles: Brian Tree portrays Posthumus’s servant Pisanio, who cannot find the heart to carry out his master’s orders to kill Innogen, with a grave feeling that is truly touching.

For a Shakespearean king the title character doesn’t get much stage time in “Cymbeline.” But the marvelous Geraint Wyn Davies cuts an imposing figure, movingly wonder-struck in the somewhat ludicrous final scene in which revelations are piled on revelations as the knot of the plot is untangled thread by thread. The emotional satisfactions of seeing king and daughter reunited, long-lost brothers returned to the fold and lovers reconciled are continually interrupted by gusts of laughter in recognition of the weird plot convolutions. Somehow the laughter at the absurdity enriches the depth of feeling — one of the myriad wonders of Shakespeare’s achievement.