Oregon Shakespeare Festival 2006 season.
Shurgot, Michael W.
The 2006 season at the Oregon Shakespeare Festival was both unusual
and surprising. Unusual was Artistic Director Libby Appel's choice
of plays: two comedies, Two Gentlemen of Verona and Merry Wives of
Windsor; one romance, The Winter's Tale; and one seldom produced
history play, King John. The season thus lacked a major tragedy, comedy,
or history, quite unlike last year's combination of Richard III,
Twelfth Night, and Marlowe's Dr. Faustus. Further, while Two
Gentlemen and Merry Wives seemed designed to please the million, when I
saw the artistically far superior Winter's Tale in the indoor Angus
Bowmer Theatre, nearly one third of the seats were empty, perhaps a
disturbing sign of changing audience tastes at OSF. I have never before
seen so many empty seats at a Shakespearean production in the Bowmer.
(1) The surprise of the season was certainly John Sipes's King John
in the New Theatre, with several sterling performances, a sharply told
story of political intrigue, and the complex interplay of history and
character. Given Sipes's production, and the play's probing of
political leadership, one wonders why this play is not produced more
often. Perhaps, as the world spins ever more perilously towards chaos,
it will be.
Reviewing Two Gentleman and Wives is especially difficult because
my personal reactions to these plays were quite different from those of
most spectators both nights at the packed Elizabethan Stage. In his
important essay "Reviewing Shakespeare for the Record," Alan
Dessen writes:
Obviously, a reviewer cannot (and should not) exclude his or her
tastes and predilections from the review ... for the unstated ideal
will always be to a degree personal, idiosyncratic. Nonetheless,
many reviews strike me as limited because they reveal much more
about the tastes of the reviewer than about the production itself
(what I think of as the 'sensibility game'), a situation especially
frustrating for the stage historian trying to use such reviews as
evidence. (2)
Mindful of Dessen's cautions about reviews that reveal more
about the reviewer than the play being discussed, I must confess
nonetheless that both these plays struck me as silly and boring. One of
the more maddening features of the OSF is its determination to make
every production at the Elizabethan Stage at least two and one-half
hours long. A major result of this preconceived time length is that when
a director gets his/her hands on a comedy with a weak plot (i.e., Two
Gentlemen and Wives), the director automatically lards the production
with innumerable gags, guffaws, props, and pratfalls apparently just to
devour time and by golly get the production to that magic hour of 11 PM.
Usually these gimmicks were at least related to the director's
"concept," as for example the innumerable "sets" in
the country-club world of Two Gentlemen. Given the laughter that
accompanied most (but not all) such stage business, especially during
Wives, I suspect that my taste in Shakespearean productions was far more
offended than that of most spectators, and that I am perhaps here
committing the error that Dessen warns against. But during both plays
the director's relentless imposition of his concept and its
attendant stage business became cumbersome and finally tedious.
Shakespeare sets Two Gentlemen in Verona, Milan, and a forest in
"the frontiers of Mantua." (3) Director Bill Rauch chose for
Verona the "Amish, Mennonite, and Shaker communities"; for
Milan a swanky country-club of wealthy lay-abouts; and for the forest a
pack of violent-looking punk rockers in green and blue spiked hair,
leather, killer boots, and chains. Rauch was obviously trying to make
the disparate locales of Shakespeare's play familiar to a
contemporary audience; the religious clan began the play lined up across
the stage in black and white neck to toe clothing, suggesting a severely
repressed community and a stage image that bordered on stereotyping. By
contrast, all was gay and far fleshier at the Milanese country club,
where Sylvia frolicked in white tennis shorts and her father, Thurio,
and Valentine later stripped to the waist for a backrub as they
discussed Sylvia's matrimonial fate. Having established the more
relaxed atmosphere of the country club, Rauch could not leave well
enough alone; every switch to the "Club" required yet another
set change: first an imaginary tennis game, then croquet, then golf, and
then finally the back-rub in the sauna. Ali of these set changes took
time and became tedious, as if Rauch could not trust his spectators to
remember that the second locale was this swanky, fleshy retreat for
millionaires. Thus did Rauch's production chug towards its
predetermined closing hour.
[ILLUSTRATION OMITTED]
This revolving stage business came to exist for its own sake, and
thus begs the question: if Rauch and OSF cannot trust the poetry and
characterization of a Shakespearean play, and must rely heavily on a
director's concept to appeal to contemporary spectators, why stage
the play at all? And if OSF is seen to "succeed" at such
productions, what does that success assert about the current state of
Shakespearean production in the United States and the direction that OSF
and similar festivals may be pursuing? While I accept Alan Dessen's
caution about revealing more of one's tastes than one ought when
reviewing productions, I nonetheless cringe at the domination of
directors' concepts in recent Shakespearean productions at OSF.
Given the visual emphasis on the different locales, this production
of Two Gentlemen was more seen than heard. However, Gregory Linington
articulated well Proteus's self-examinations and hypocrisy,
especially his soliloquies in 2.6 and in 4.2. And disguised as a waiter
at the country club in 4.4.89ff, Miriam Luabe as Julia was especially
poignant as she fondled her own ring while gazing at the picture of
Sylvia that the Club's hired artist had completed earlier. The most
frustrating moments occurred at the end, which is notorious enough as it
is. Having invested considerable time and energy in the elaborate sets,
Rauch simply abandoned Sylvia in 5.4. Although Sarah Rutan, a lovely
young woman, had played Sylvia as coy and flirtatious throughout, for
the play's climax, as she is traded between Proteus and Valentine,
Rauch had her sitting at the front edge of the stage, stone silent, and
staring out into the audience as her future was determined. This sudden
inconsistency in her demeanor was impossible to accept; where was her
spirit, her resolve, as behind her, two men, both for a moment equally
false, played her as a pawn? If Rauch could invent all sorts of games
and gimmicks to make the country club setting relevant to his audience,
where was his sense of what was happening to Sylvia in the script's
final moments? Rauch's production was so visually oriented that he
lost all sense of his characters' inner lives at the play's
crucial moment. While the ending of this play is immensely difficult,
and certainly repellent to women, denying Rutan's Sylvia any
reaction at all to her situation seems irresponsible, not only to Sylvia
and Rutan, but also to female spectators in the theatre.
Like Bill Rauch, Andrew Tsao invested heavily in his set for Merry
Wives. The entire width and height of the Elizabethan Stage was painted
in vivid colors: purple, lime, rose, green, orange, chartreuse. Across
the central doors was a huge painting of Windsor castle and the
surrounding countryside and above the stage hung a large sign reading
"Berkshire." Those whom Malvolio would label the "little
people" of the plot were all dressed in the motley of circus
clowns, suggesting that this play was occurring in a fun-house time warp
that combined elements of contemporary (the Pages and Fords, Dr. Caius,
Sir Hugh Evans) and Elizabethan (Falstaff and his cronies, Mistress
Quickly, Simple) dress. With G. Valmont Thomas as a robust, huge, and
hearty Falstaff whose boisterous laugh echoed throughout the theatre,
the essential farce of the play dominated the production.
Like previous productions of Merry Wives at OSF (especially in
2001), this year's version was replete with stage business and
gratuitous gestures that occasionally amplified a character but mostly
just consumed time. For example, Sir Hugh Evans wore a ridiculous hat
that must have been two feet wide and six feet long and was curled at
both ends. Given this monstrous hat, he had to do something with it, so
he constantly bumped into other characters while talking and gesturing;
this cranial appendage thus made him dangerous to be around. Armando
Duran as Dr. Caius created a sufficiently mangled French accent that
other characters couldn't always understand it, so he often
repeated phrases or whole sentences, thus consuming more time. Thomas
attempted to enliven Falstaff with his loud voice and ample gestures;
but even in this emotionally uncomplicated role, Thomas's limited
range failed to lift his character above the gluttonous buffoon.
[ILLUSTRATION OMITTED]
The major surprise of this production was Jonathan Haugen as Master
Ford. Haugen found in Ford's equally repetitive actions real
passions. While Merry Wives is simplistic compared to Winter's
Tale, and Ford is hardly as complex a character as Leontes, nonetheless
Haugen's jealousy and anger were palpable. Especially after his
second failure to find Falstaff in his house, Haugen's pathos was
genuine; he was less a man possessed of a baseless fury than a man
seriously disturbed by emotions he could neither understand nor control.
When he sought and received forgiveness from his wife, one sensed a man
who, in the midst of this farcical circus, had experienced real jealousy
that arose from within a genuine love for his wife and his own emotional
weaknesses. Given Haugen's portrayal of Master Ford, one perceives
some link between Merry Wives and the more profound Winter's Tale.
Director Libby Appel opened Winter's Tale with an invented
scene replacing 1.1: Paulina and Mamillius, who held a teddy bear,
sitting downstage center speaking of sad tales "of sprites and
goblins" that are best for winter, amid lighting director Robert
Peterson's stunning visual effects. Initially the entire stage was
bathed in deep blue and white, a pied beauty suggesting snowy fields
seen from afar; bare trees dotted the back of the stage, evoking a stark
landscape. As the guests assembled for 1.2, four chandeliers dropped
from the ceiling and brightened the stage, creating cozy warmth in the
bleak midwinter. Leontes and Polixenes, in formal attire of Edwardian
nobility, danced gaily with the women of the court dressed in elegant
gowns. Immediately evident was one of Appel's most arresting
choices: Hermione was not visibly pregnant, certainly nowhere near the
end of her term, and thus one could reasonably believe that she might
have become pregnant by Polixenes since his arrival. Even if this
possibility was not Appel's intention, the choice of a barely
pregnant Hermione lent some credibility to Leontes's jealous rage
and created an intriguing complication for the plot. Further, because
William Langan as Leontes was noticeably older than both Miriam Laube as
Hermione and Rex Young as Polixenes, these casting choices suggested an
intriguing possibility among the three characters: that Hermione might
have been sexually attracted to the younger Polixenes. These
possibilities were encouraged when Hermione kissed Polixenes immediately
after he agreed to stay, and Hermione was visibly pleased to have him
remain longer in her court.
Appel used this moment to ignite Leontes's rage. As
Leontes's jealousy progressed, he became increasingly isolated
onstage, standing downstage center in a shaft of light as the assembled
guests mingled upstage behind him. As if embodying his visions of their
intimacy ("Your actions are my dreams"), Polixenes and
Hermione danced and laughed center stage behind him, and at one point
Polixenes actually played with Mamillius, showing far more affection for
him than Leontes did while telling Mamillius to "go play" as
he believed his mother had with Polixenes. Hermione's "If you
would seek us, / We are yours I' the garden. Shall's attend
you there?" (1.2.177-78), an apparently innocent line, infuriated Leontes, whose reaction indicated his grasp of the association with
sexual sin in Eden and his anger that he would be attended by his wife
together with another man. In his soliloquy "Gone already"
(1.2.185-207), Leontes stood center stage, isolated again in light,
oblivious of his son's presence on stage, and spoke directly to
male spectators about the number of men whose wives have been
"sluiced" by Sir Smile. Langan's frantic gestures and
quivering voice superbly rendered the image of an older man convinced
that his younger wife has been unfaithful, and while there is no textual
basis for Leontes's jealousy, Appel's directorial choices
created just enough ambiguity to lend some credence to Leontes's
subsequent rage. By the time Leontes had "drunk, and seen the
spider," he was clearly unhinged.
Appel's blocking and the excellent supporting cast, especially
Greta Oglesby as Paulina, Mark Murphey as Antigonus, and Jeffrey King as
Camillo, created several powerful moments. Camillo was visibly stunned
at Leontes's suggestion of the Queen's adultery, and conveyed
forcefully to Polixenes his utter terror at Leontes's order to kill
him. In 2.1, after Mamillius is led out and Leontes accuses Hermione,
Antigonus tried desperately to convince Leontes otherwise, and the sheer
passion of Murphey's pleading further isolated Leontes as he stood
alone downstage center. Murphey's interaction with Ogelsby in 2.3
was especially effective; his exasperated deference to Paulina as she
strode right through his lines ("I told her so, my lord"),
only moments after his own anger at Leontes, comically heralded
Paulina's powerful rage. Leontes labels Paulina "A mankind
witch," and throughout her confrontations with Leontes,
Paulina's fury thrashed him. As Antigonus and others backed away,
she boldly moved towards Leontes and placed the babe in his arms.
Sitting center stage, holding his own daughter, he seemed for a second
the proud father, only to stand and leave the child on the chair.
Paulina then picked up the baby, realizing suddenly that her attempt to
save the child had failed. Paulina's catalog of the babe's
paternal likeness as she moved among the lords only further isolated
Leontes, and her crisp "I pray you, do not push me; I'll be
gone" (2.3.125) to Antigonus, who clearly feared her far more than
Leontes, was simultaneously a comic release from the palpable tension of
this scene and a stern reminder that here was an indomitable woman.
Hermione entered her trial in a simple white smock, suggesting her
innocence, and walking painfully as befits a woman who has recently
given birth. She stood center stage and spoke deliberately, her rhythm
confident and diction precise; a woman completely self-assured, Paulina
without the rage, trying patiently to convince Leontes of his madness:
"Sir, spare your thoughts. / The bug which you would fright me
with, I seek" (3.2.91-92). As in 2.3, Leontes stood apart, avoiding
Hermione's eyes as she spoke. A harp played as Apollo's decree
was read, evoking a mythic serenity in Leontes's unruly kingdom.
The perfect joy of Hermione's "Praised" at her
vindication, so deeply felt that one almost forgot--or wished away--the
text, was instantly shattered as Leontes grabbed the scroll and tore it,
followed immediately by the servant's news that Mamillius had
suddenly died. Paulina's re-entry was immensely powerful. Leontes
cowed before her fury as she beat his prostrate body and screamed of the
queen's death, relenting only when her own rage at both
Leontes's error and her earlier failure to convince the king of his
paternity was exhausted. Taken together, Langan's remorse, as he
ironically lay in a fetal position beneath Paulina's beating, and
Oglesby's rage set up convincingly the necessary fiction for
the rest of the play: that Hermione is indeed dead and only a miracle
will restore that which is lost. Oglesby's doubling as Time neatly
suggested Paulina's central importance to the play; as she slowly
cured Leontes's guilt in Sicilia, so in Bohemia she introduced a
lovely springtime, the only pretty ring time. Christopher DuVal as
Autolycus was but patched and mended, his motley stitched together with
remnants from previous clowns, especially Feste. He was also immensely
clever and loved his own wit, with which he hilariously engaged the
front row spectators. As a professional thief, he "stole" a
few purses from women and actually emptied them onstage, and the night I
saw him he ad-libbed about the contents ("Oh, a nice cell phone. I
wonder what this is worth!"), and then pocketed the phone. He was
also quite adept at stealing from the simple shepherds, and hauled
onstage a wagon whose sides folded down to reveal multiple shelves
filled with dozens of stockings, ballads, flowers, and contemporary
goods stolen (we were to believe) from spectators in the front rows on
previous nights. The combination of his audacious stealing, rapid-fire
wit, and spontaneous cavorting around stage--I can't imagine that
his antics were similar in any two consecutive performances--reminded
one of Hamlet's lament about clowns who steal the show during a
"serious" moment in a play and apparently, as DuVal obviously
did, have a damn good time doing so. His hilarious clowning also created
a marvelously enjoyable setting for the sheep-shearing scene, which in
turn made all the more frightening its collapse into Polixenes's
rage at his son's perfidy. Josiah Phillips as Perdita's father
stumbled blindly about the stage once Florizel was unmasked, and their
huge relief at Autolycus's "assistance" became the
perfect foil for DuVal's hilarious, knee-slapping,
self-congratulatory conviction that Fortune would never suffer him to be
honest. Here indeed was a clown enjoying being a clown.
Those preferring what Daniel Seltzer used to term the
"miraculous" interpretation of Act 5 would have applauded
Appel's staging. From lines 1-123 of Act 5, Leontes, Cleomenes,
Dion, and Paulina discuss whether or not Leontes should re-marry and
"bless the bed of majesty again / With a sweet fellow
to't" (33-34). During this scene Paulina receives
Leontes's assurance that he shall not marry again "till
[Paulina] bidd'st us." Paulina insists "That / Shall be
when your first queen's again in breath; / Never till then"
(83-84). One can argue, as most scholars would, that this promise
assures spectators that Hermione is in fact alive and that Paulina has
been hiding her these sixteen years. But Paulina's lines could also
suggest her firm belief in miracles, spiritual and theatrical, as
indicated later by her requirement that all in the theatre must awaken
their faith. After the entrance of Florizel, Perdita, Cleomenes and
others at 123, Paulina does not speak again until 225, where she insists
that Hermione was "more worth" the king's gaze than even
the beauty of Perdita. During this long silence, unusual for a character
who has previously commanded the stage both verbally and physically,
Paulina stood absolutely still as she gazed upon Perdita. The second
that Perdita entered, Paulina froze; she alone had recognized Perdita,
and if that which was lost had been found, then Hermione could breathe
again, and miracles abound.
[ILLUSTRATION OMITTED]
After the outrageous sartorial splendor of the gentlemen shepherd
and son--Phillips's feathered hat was so huge he could barely keep
his head straight--the simple beauty of the statue scene was stunning.
Hermione's statue rose on a pedestal from beneath the stage. She
wore an elegant white gown, an ironic reminder of the plain smock she
had worn at her trial, and held a blue scarf she had worn in the opening
scene. As the characters slowly circled the statue, and Perdita knelt
and asked the Queen to give her "that hand of yours to kiss,"
Paulina assumed the role of priestess. She commanded the solemn music
that filled the theatre as she implored Leontes to proceed towards
liberation from his long agony: "I could afflict you further";
"Shall I draw the curtain?" (5.3.75, 83). With each question
Paulina led Leontes and us towards the miracle she now knew could occur,
and she turned deliberately towards the audience to insist that we all
awake our faith. Amid perfect silence, Paulina removed a veil from the
statue's head, Hermione turned towards Leontes, and suddenly moved
her hand towards him. After Paulina exhorts the statue to "Strike
all that look upon with marvel," and "Bequeath to death your
numbness, for from him / Dear life redeems you" (100, 102-03),
Hermione stepped down and embraced Leontes in a long and passionate
kiss. For several seconds she was aware only of Leontes, and we saw a
miracle of love and forgiveness. Appel staged literally the words of
Camillo and Polixenes, "She embraces him"; "She hangs
about his neck," so that Paulina's words to Perdita,
"Please you to interpose, fair madam," comically suggested
that someone had better interrupt this kiss lest we be in the theatre
all night. Hermione's asking the gods to "pour your graces /
Upon my daughter's head" (123-24) emphasized the miraculous
possibilities that Appel's staging had fashioned.
Leontes, Hermione, and Perdita led the court upstage towards an
autumnal sunset that accentuated the bare trees of Act 1. Paulina, who
did accept Camillo's hand in marriage, turned around midway and
walked back downstage to remind us that a sad tale is best for winter.
Without Mamillius, whose teddy bear had heralded the death of Antigonus,
her words were doubly chilling.
John Sipes's robust production of King John in the New Theatre
combined medieval England with early twentieth-century Europe to evoke
timeless questions about the nature of leadership and the consequences
of political failure. William Bloodgood's set was simple and
unobtrusive; initially a throne, draped in red, sat center stage beneath
castle walls, upstage from which Hubert de Burgh would challenge John
and Philip, Arthur would fall, and upon which film clips of World War
One and Two would be shown. Other props included tables upon which the
kings and their allies, wearing the long coats of European generals from
both world wars, plotted their strategy, and occasionally furniture to
mark the courts of England and France. Unlike the crowded sets of Two
Gentlemen and Merry Wives, Bloodgood's essentially bare stage
allowed the production to focus on the actors and their generally superb
articulation of Shakespeare's story. One sees here the influence of
the production's dramaturg, Alan Armstrong of Southern Oregon
University, a fine scholar and a proponent of this production style at
the OSF.
Superb performances by several actors enlivened this historical
clash of powerful and complex characters. As King John, Michael Elich
brought equal skill to John's many moods. He entered 1.1 in regal
red and white to the applause of his court, as happens when Patrick
Stewart as Claudius enters 1.2 in the BBC Hamlet. With Derrick Lee
Weeden doubling as Pandulph and in 1.1 as Chatillon, Elich and Weeden
initiated their many dynamic exchanges in the play. Equally compelling
was Jeanne Paulsen as Eleanor, whose commanding presence and powerful
voice fiercely defended John's kingship. The set enabled a
compelling staging of 2.1, presenting cleanly the angry debates and
complex motives central to the play's history. Armando Duran as
Hubert de Burgh spoke powerfully for the common men and women of this
play whose lives kings and dictators have forever sacrificed, and
Bloodgood's projection across the stones of Angiers of battle
scenes from both world wars emphasized the continuing slaughter of
innocent humankind wrought by ruthless politicians. The conflicting
advice of Philip the Bastard, dressed in a three-piece suit as the CEO of John's kingdom who, downstage, urged a dual attack against
Angiers, and Hubert, who, dressed in a workman's simple clothes,
urged from the city walls the marriage of Blanche and Lewis to save his
town, emphasized clearly both the fickleness of John and Philip and
their love of "commodity," the Bastard's favorite word.
Rene Millan delivered the Bastard's long soliloquy, which concluded
Act 2, as a vicious satire on such feckless royalty and suggested
perhaps an early Thersites in his contempt for his betters and their
"base and vile-concluded peace."
Robynn Rodriguez as Constance urged Arthur's claim to the
throne as fiercely as Jeanne Paulsen's Eleanor supported
John's. As 3.1 unfolded, again the simple set, the actors'
excellent command of Shakespeare's verse, and Sipes's
thoughtful blocking energized one of the play's central scenes. As
if chosen by divine guidance, Emma Hardin as Arthur knelt in a pool of
light as Constance urged his claim. Then from her knees she rose in fury
as John, Philip, and their entourage arrived at court. She spat out
"War, war, no peace! Peace is to me a war" (3.1.113), and
heralded the ensuing "war" between John and Philip instigated
by Weeden's majestic entrance as Pandulph, decked from miter to
foot in the Cardinal's brilliant red attire. Speaking intially from
above in carefully modulated sentences and precise diction, suggesting
what Pandulph assumes is his morally superior position, Weeden
articulated Pandulph's demands as he walked down steps leading from
the city walls and then briskly moved among the court, turning to face
one, then another, as his arguments developed. Weeden's performance
here was riveting; every vocal modulation, every movement, every pause,
every gesture was linked precisely to his words and calculated to
promote his cause, and his stately calm amid the tension that his words
created further solidified his power among these nobles.
The flashing of battle scenes from World War Two during 3.2, the
cold plotting of Arthur's death in 3.3, Constance's grief in
3.4, and the near murder of Arthur in 4.1--all played in rapid
succession on the bare stage---hurled the play into its nether regions.
As in Richard III, here innocence does not protect the young, and only
Hubert's tortured conscience, superbly realized by Duran, saved
Arthur's life as he sat strapped to a chair, an early vision of
Gloucester's hideous suffering. In 4.2, Elich, richly attired and
speaking gravely, attempted to recapture John's nobility and power,
only to unravel swiftly as Pembroke and Salisbury implicated him in
Arthur's death and the Bastard informed him of the French invasion.
By 155, where John urges the Bastard to hang the prophet who calls for
him to relinquish his crown, John was on his knees crying, a king
suddenly destitute of authority and frantically ordering the death of
innocents as earlier he had been willing to sacrifice the citizens of
Anglers. Elich successfully realized in this scene the enigmas of the
historical King John. As Hubert cradled Arthur's body in 4.3, the
dead child embodied the terrifying costs of human greed and violence:
"Now for the bare-picked bone of majesty / Doth dogged war bristle his angry crest, / And snarleth in the gentle eyes of peace"
(4.3.148-50). Perhaps in Arthur's mangled innocence lay an image
for our times. (4)
[ILLUSTRATION OMITTED]
Amid political intrigue between church and state and gruesome
scenes of war splashed across the walls of Anglers, the dominant image
of Act 5 is the poisoned king. That Weeden's commanding performance
as the Pope's emissary should devolve into an obscure monk's
poisoning of a king; Pandulph fail to quell the war he instigated; and
Elich's King John exit disgraced and dying, all emphasize, despite
the Bastard's stirring exhortation to war, the unresolved ironies
of this play. On the bare stage, the images of King John on his royal
throne, conniving Cardinal Pandulph in his stunning red, modern generals
ruthlessly plotting war, Hubert begging peace from two armed camps, and
terrified Arthur leaping to his death coalesced in a memorable
production of a play that may be more relevant to our times than we care
to admit.
Michael W. Shurgot, Seattle, Washington
Notes
(1.) The Angus Bowmer Theatre seats 600 people. 200 empty seats for
as compelling a play as The Winter's Tale is disturbing.
(2.) "Reviewing Shakespeare for the Record," Shakespeare
Quarterly, 35 (1985): 602-08.
(3.) The Complete Works of Shakespeare, 4th ed., ed. David
Bevington (New York: Harper Collins, 1992).
(4.) As Alan Armstrong observed in his review of the 2005 OSF
Richard III, director Libby Appel inexplicably cut the Scrivener's
scene, thus robbing the play of a scene of immense relevance to our
time. Shakespeare Bulletin, 24:1 (2006): 73-77. Armstrong writes:
At a time when news media, managed by the entertainment division of
multinational corporations, had failed us, a theatre company could
have staged a Richard III that really mattered--not by laboring
heavy-handedly to establish parallels with the misdeeds of the
current administration, but simply by letting the scrivener's
words--Shakespeare's words--be spoken freely on stage. (77)
