The Royal Shakespeare Company is on stage at Chicago Shakes in the long awaited epic sequel of Shakespeare’s Macbeth. Dunsinane takes over and tells the story if Lady Macbeth was still alive and Siward was settling the affairs of Scotland in the name of the English Monarch.
I haven’t seen a production on the Chicago Shakespeare stage that hasn’t been fully produced by them. I was a little apprehensive that it would not live up to their high standards. There was no need to worry. This production lives up to and exceeds some aspects of Chicago Shake’s productions.
Most impressive is Tom Gill playing the Boy Soldier. He has a great naivety that produces great wisdom. Other standouts includes the queens maids whose vocals were spot on along with live three piece band.
Overall I would recommend this show to anyone who likes Macbeth and enjoys what if scenarios.
Grade: A-
Category Archives: Chicago Shakespeare
Pericles
The set is beautiful wood grain with the sense of flowing sand. There is a huge entrance upstage center along with large jungle looking platforms extreme stage right and stage left. As always before a Chicago Shakes show I am excited and nervous about being able to comprehend the language but I know with this quality of show it will be very well done.
For a Friday night I am surprised that it is not sold out.
The show started out slowly with costumes that seemed more cartoonish than Shakespearean. One character reminded me of Jafar from Aladdin. But I learned that it was supposed to make me uncomfortable because it ended up being a character that I shouldn’t like along with his kingdom.
The story is based around the king of Tyre’s travels. He is shown to be good man that helps neighboring nations. He is ship wrecked and proven to be a gentleman in another kings court. He wins the hand of the princess and they are blessed with a daughter during their sea travel back to Tyre. The new queen dies or so we are meant to think and her body is sealed in casket and sent overboard. The king decides the baby will not last the journey names her Marina and leaves her with another kingdom. The queen of the new kingdom becomes jealous of her and has her henchman kill her. He tries and is unable when pirates kidnap her and sell her to a whore house. Pericles is told she is dead. He goes into great despair. Marina refuses to give away her virtue and when men pay to lay with her they end up repenting and turning a new leaf including the governor of this land. Marina is sent to help those who lives are downtrodden when she is led to her father. They reveal to each who they are. Pericles grants the governor his daughter’s hand and they go to the temple of Diana to be wed. There they find Thalia Pericles’ thought to be dead wife. The end.
Two and a half hours of great storytelling. Many actors played multiple roles and all were great. Above all the music in the show was well written and had a very nautical sound. If I would change anything it would be the projections. At times they were distracting. A lot of them were for the sake of doing it and didn’t add to the action, but many of them were very useful.
King Lear
Henry V
This show was well directed. That is why it received a B and not lower. It is apparent that the director used the Saint Crispin’s Day speech as a concept for the play, because the idea of a band of brothers was used well. However it seemed the actor playing Henry V, Harry Judge was in a very different production that was all about him. Having known some that have worked with Judge in the past this is common for productions he is in. I can understand the directors choice of him for Henry being selfish in the way that Shakespeare wrote the play, but I think Judge needed to make contact with his fellow actors and create moments with them and not worry about doing it on his own.
The actor that stole the show was Greg Vinkler playing both Ensign Pistol and King Charles VI. The amount of play he put into Pistol in direct contrast to the stifled character of Charles proved to me that he deserves at least kudos for a job well done. Most of the actors played duel roles and most did quite well except Samuel Taylor who in one of his roles played The Daupin and every time he spoke I wanted to climb on stage and muzzle him. He did make choices, but those choices were bad and perhaps thats the director’s fault for not bringing him back to reality. For him it seemed like he made the character a caricature when everyone else in the show was believable and real.
The best part of the show was the talk back at the end of the Wednesday matinee that I attended. I got to learn a bunch about the the show and why some choices were made and some of the Shakespearean history.
Grade: B