★★☆☆☆ Confusing. Haphazard. Far-Fetched. Convoluted. For centuries, such words have been used repeatedly to describe Cymbeline, Shakespeare’s rarely staged late tragicomedy that is being performed on the Boston Common by Commonwealth Shakespeare Company through Aug 4. George Bernard Shaw even famously called it “stagy trash.” Trash, I’m not sure, but it […]
SOMETHING BORROWED, SOMETHING NEW: SHAKESPEARE’S ROMEO AND JULIET AT HUNTINGTON THEATRE COMPANY
★★★★★ Walking into the Huntington Avenue Theatre to take your seat at its current production of Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet, you might be reminded of your middle school field trip to the United Nations. You might also remember the American Repertory Theater’s recent staging of Othello, where TV screens and army barracks aimed […]
SEEDS OF MISTRUST IN A.R.T.’S OTHELLO
★★★★☆ Othello, William Shakespeare’s quintessential tale of race-baiting political treachery, has more connections to contemporary society than one might care to admit (or write down). As observed in the Oregon Shakespeare Festival’s production, now in performance at the American Repertory Theater, the story of a virtuous black leader brought down by the vindictive […]
LAND HO, SO-SO: TWELFTH NIGHT AND SHIPWRECKED! IN REP AT MOONBOX PRODUCTIONS
★★☆☆☆ If Duke Orsino in Shakespeare’s beloved comedy Twelfth Night has picked up his (sometimes misbegotten) ideas of love from hearing enchanting strains of music, Louis de Rougemont, the self-proclaimed narrator/protagonist/hero/villain of Donald Margulies’ Shipwrecked! An Entertainment has gotten his ideas about adventure from books. The Odyssey, Robinson Caruso, Ten Thousand Leagues Under […]
A MODERN VERSE MACBETH THIS WAY COMES
★★★☆☆ This new season at Actors’ Shakespeare Project—the first under artistic director Christopher V. Edwards, who took over from Allyn Burrows last year—is a welcome change of pace for the troupe that has of late been presenting, well, mostly Shakespeare. Edwards seems intent on looking forward, though, and his breath of […]
A BOY IN LIMBO, LOOKING FOR SHAKESPEARE: HAMNET AT ARTSEMERSON
★★★☆☆ Given the choice of to be or not to be, Hamnet Shakespeare can’t fathom why anyone would ever choose not to be. And being that he’s had over 400 years to think about it, I guess you could say the boy’s given the matter some thought. Hamnet, only son of William, has […]
NAKED VILLAINY UNDER THE STARS: RICHARD III ON THE COMMON
★★★★☆ It’s been only five months since the last production of Richard III hit Boston, so I was relatively unenthused when Commonwealth Shakespeare Company announced it as their choice for this summer’s free Shakespeare on the Common. But Steven Maler’s stylish, electric production—which will run through Aug 5—makes a great case for its […]
IN CHELSEA, ONE HELL OF A DREAM: A MIDSUMMER NIGHT’S DREAM AT APOLLINAIRE THEATRE
★★★★★ If there’s only one thing you do this week, it should be to find time to get to Chelsea’s PORT Park to catch Apollinaire Theatre Company’s practically perfect (and free) production of William Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream. It isn’t only that this outdoor production takes full and inventive advantage of Chelsea’s […]
A RIVETING RICHARD III AT ACTORS’ SHAKESPEARE PROJECT
★★★★☆ Richard III is the third production of Actors’ Shakespeare Project’s current season, themed “The Downfall of Despots.” It follows Exit the King, an absurdist comedy about an incompetent king who has run his country into the ground, and Julius Caesar, a look at the perils of rhetoric-loving, narcissistic politicians. The parallels […]
TO BE STONED … THE MAKING OF ‘HIGH HAMLET’
He’ll be stoned enough for all of us.
