As You Like It
Regrettably, fresh breezes don’t always blow through revivals of As You Like It; its magic can succumb to directors who miss the romance and ram home the easy class contrasts–court versus country–that fuel the humor. Touchstone’s sneering dismissals of the “country copulatives” and melancholy Jaques’ puncturing of the pastoral idyll are amusing, but they’re counterweights to the play’s obsession: measuring love against the standard of nature.
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The first and final delight of Shakespeare Repertory’s wondrous production is its arboreal look: nature is here, beautifully and bountifully. Michael Philippi’s splendid set goes from greensward (with a gravel pit for the wrestling match) to a gorgeous forest glade with swaying trees bathed in Joe Tilford’s dappled light, a vista worthy of Watteau’s or Fragonard’s cultivated fetes champetres, and magical enough to explain the transformations of the play’s final scenes.
Deborah Staples as the charming Celia, graciously suggesting a demure Victorian maiden who wishes she too could shed her skirts, makes us regret her conventional alliance with Orlando’s reformed elder brother (a sturdily unflashy Matt Penn). Shakespeare’s other amorous couples mate more than they court. Little romance is wasted between William Dick’s opportunistic Touchstone (less funny than the part, given his insistently emphatic delivery) and Tina Thuerwachter’s ruttish Audrey. Their crudeness can be justified as so much grist for the groundlings, but many may wonder about the advisability of playing the moonstruck shepherd Silvius and his unfeeling bumpkin sweetheart Phebe as refugees from Hee Haw. Edward Jemison as Silvius outdoes Gomer Pyle in an oddly endearing but clearly condescending performance. And what are these hillbilly homespuns doing in 19th-century France anyway?
