...as put on by the Bell Shakespeare company. Already had my eye on it, but then Sarah W organised an MS AC outing so I went with her (plus beau Keith Wo--), Nicolette, Natasha, Jarrod, Jason and Katherine on Thursday night (Kai also coincidentally there, with her beau Neil in tow). I quite enjoyed it, but more simply because it was a chance to see Romeo and Juliet put on, on stage, than for the merits of the particular production itself; it was well enough done, but somehow I felt that it failed to penetrate to the truth of the play or to illuminate it in any meaningful manner.
It's hard to put one's finger on the reasons for these kinds of responses, but here it had something to do with the choices made by the director - choices which almost seemed not to be choices at all. For example, the costumes and general ethos are quite contemporary - the tale, it seems, has been updated to our time, at least if the hip hop stylings of the opening chorus and the generally everyday (more or less) costumes worn by all are anything to go by...but the longer the play goes on, the more it slides towards a more traditional manner of presentation, and I wasn't sure if this was deliberate (I would imagine not) and, if so, what purpose it served. The effect of this apparent setting of events in a kind of amorphously contemporary milieu was unconvincing - it seemed done only for the sake of some ill-defined idea of relevance without anything deeper underlying or motivating the choice.
Then, too, there was Juliet, who was the subject of most interval and post-show conversation. In this production, she's very much the rather histrionic and sometimes petulant teenage girl rather than the more tragically romantic figure that other interpretations often offer - and I wasn't sure whether Chloe Armstrong's performance was merely uneven or actually seeking to convey a progression in Juliet's character (it was also interesting that, by design or inadvertence - probably the former, I think - she flattened out her delivery of all the famous lines, perhaps in an attempt to bring them home to us anew, in some measure removed from the deep layering of associations which so many of them carry with their every utterance).
Also, on stage the burning love between her and Romeo requires more of a suspension of disbelief - it's a medium which lends itself far less to aestheticisation than, say, film (one positive effect of seeing this has been the development of a great desire to watch the Luhrmann version again) and so probably depends more on its leads, and I wasn't feeling any particular chemistry between the two here. (Most of the other figures acquit themselves well, though - I thought that John Batchelor as Capulet was particularly good in rendering that figure sympathetically, Matthew Moore as Mercutio was fun (although, as Nicolette pointed out, Mercutio is a great character for an actor to take on), and James Hird lookalike Paul Eastway did a good job in bringing some interest to the earnest, do-gooding character of Benvolio.)
Anyway, still glad that I went, and will try to get out to the company's production of "The Tempest" when it comes around in a little while.
