THE BASICS: This relatively fast-moving and accessible Shakespearean drama is the second and final offering of this season’s Shakespeare in Delaware Park. It has been directed by Steve Vaughan, and plays nightly, excepting Mondays and rainy nights, behind the Rose Garden. It runs approximately two hours, with one intermission. There is no official charge, but you will be expected to contribute something when the actors canvass the audience at the break.
THUMBNAIL SKETCH: Although CAESAR has always been grouped with the tragedies, it really fails to function as one. Shakespeare has provided us instead with a walking tour through a period of political turmoil, where the major players and their actions are all decidedly ambiguous. Bluntly put, the play has no moral compass. We witness the conspiracy against Caesar, his assassination, and the subsequent downfall of the conspirators, with the accession of Mark Antony and Octavius. Who are the good guys here, and who the villains? Was the assassination a good or bad idea? The Bard doesn’t seem to want to take sides. If you think you know the answers, drop me an e-mail!
THE CAST: The enormous cast of 26 are mainly volunteers. Doug Zschiegner, pensive and sturdy as an oak, anchors the production very nicely as Marcus Brutus. Tim Newell is well cast as the snake, Cassius, a portrait in envy that was Shakespeare’s warm-up for Iago. Dan Walker, an actor of stature, gives Caesar a little jaunty strength at the outset. This works. Adriano Gatto is a youthful but dynamic Mark Anthony. Surprise of the night: David Bontrow, who gives the decidedly minor character of Decius Brutus a wonderful, oily charm. Lovely Diane DiBernardo needs to dial down the anger some as Brutus’ wife Portia; at present she is just too hostile to warrant any audience sympathy.
PRODUCTION VALUES: Vaughan’s direction is steady and solid, though nothing special. His main contribution was to streamline the script, so that those groundlings without comfy chairs won’t have to squirm as long. We were forewarned that this production would be spartan, and so it is. The economies on some occasions work against the production. An example: After the conspirators have dispatched Caesar they smear themselves with… nothing, and march out, holding high their imaginarily bloodied hands. A bucket of bright red latex paint would have worked miracles here! A little more incidental music would have helped, too. And why do all the Roman senators wear the exact same outfit? They’re not a baseball team, y’know!
FINAL THOUGHTS: Though full of good one-liners and beloved of high schools, JULIUS CAESAR is far from great Shakespeare. Among other things, there’s no poetry in it. The Delaware Park production is serviceable, but without much lustre.
RATING: THREE BUFFALOS.