SHAKESPEARE, BEATLES AND WRESTLING. WHAT’S NOT TO LIKE?
Like peanut butter and chocolate, some combinations just work.
That is most certainly the case with Daryl Cloran’s cleverly designed adaptation of Shakespeare’s As You Like It, which marries 25 Beatles tunes with one of the playwright’s most popular comedies. Slam in some professional wrestling (“Completely not fake! Totally real!”) and you’ve got a raucously hilarious outing in the Citadel’s Shoctor Theatre.
The run finishes up on March 15, but don’t delay buying tickets. Everybody wants a piece of this hybrid, a co-production with the Royal Manitoba Theatre Centre that is on its way to a spring run at Chicago Shakespeare Theatre. Set in the flower-powered 1960s, the production (originally crafted by The Citadel’s Cloran for Vancouver’s 2018 Bard at the Beach festival) takes the best comic bits of the multi-duo love story and amplifies them with seamlessly blended Beatles tunes.
The tale sees Orlando (the appealing Jeff Irving) disowned by his father, and plagued by a nasty older brother (Benjamin Camenzuli). Orlando decides to wrestle to prove he’s a man, as one would. At the match, he meets groupie Rosalind (Lindsey Angell) and falls in love with her. Rosalind is forced to flee town, disguising herself as a man named Ganymede for cover.
She heads with her cousin Celia (Jamella Mcneil) to, yes, an orchard in the Okanagan.
Orlando also escapes to the Okanagan (the local reference gets chortles from the audience throughout the evening) after learning his evil brother wants him dead. Suddenly, everybody is in the orchard, along with a band and a psychedelic Volkswagen camper van.
Shakespeare and the Beatles notwithstanding, the 15-member cast of As You Like It is what really makes the production work. You’ll be in their thrall, starting 15 minutes before the show even begins when a professional wrestling match warms up the actors and the audience.
The character of the court jester Touchstone (played brilliantly by Kayvon Koshkam, who was in the Vancouver and Winnipeg productions) is delightful without completely chewing up the scenery. As both a hapless family servant dragging luggage through the orchard and the ringmaster for the wrestling match, Touchstone sets a playful tone for the evening. In classic fool fashion, he speaks to all the things we are secretly wondering, like why some characters must dive behind trees when others walk on stage.
“Because it’s Shakespeare,” says Touchstone.
(This must also be the reason women dress as men and thus are unable to attract the men they really want, because, hello, they are dressed like men. And what’s with the multiple weddings in Shakespeare? Were they the gender reveal parties of their day?)
Also a treat from the very first scene is Edmonton’s own Farren Timoteo. We see him in the warm-up, as Fabuloso (“so small and oily”), who tackles the larger wrestler, Charles (Austin Eckert) with a garbage can lid known as
The Spanish Inquisition. Later, as Silvius, he throws himself with equal abandon at Phoebe (Emily Dallas), who doesn’t deserve him.
With long, straight hair and a Burt Reynolds moustache, Silvius is a cross between a hillbilly and one of the junior Manson murderers. Watching Timoteo perform fight scenes and dances choreographed by Jonathan Hawley Purvis is side-splitting. He is a worm in overalls.
Performances by the nine musicians in this production are exceptional. Yes, they are working with pretty good material, but bring their own expert spin. The songs selected by Cloran and music director Ben Elliot are masterfully compiled to mirror the script. You’ve Got to Hide Your Love Away feels custom-designed for Ganymede. Let it Be is perfect when tired and hungry travellers arrive at the orchard.
That is what is so amazing about both Shakespeare and the Beatles. The stories within the art are universal and can fit within many hearts and minds. And did you realize that the original version of As You Like It actually had five complete songs in it?
For all we know, Shakespeare was the Beatles of his time.
For further information, visit citadeltheatre.com or call 780425-1820.