The Tempest
Reviewed by Martίn Hernández
The Antaeus Company, Kiki & David Gindler Performing Arts Center
Through July 30
RECOMMENDED
Director Nike Doukas adds a three-piece combo and rocking beat to Shakespeare’s tale of magic, revenge, and love in a production that is part musical, part radio play, and all fun. Rather than a set that depicts the play’s island motif, Doukas and scenic designer Angela Balogh Calin strategically place tables – cluttered with sundry auditory devices – and a handy spiral staircase on the stripped-down stage. The cast members use handheld, standing, and table microphones as props and to deliver the tunes, dialogue, and vocal and mechanical sound effects.
Twelve years have passed since Prospero (Peter Van Norden), the powerful sorcerer and former Duke of Milan, and his then three-year-old daughter Miranda (Anja Racić), were deposited on a tropical island after his two-faced brother Antonio (Bernard K. Addison) deposed him. While he rails about his sibling’s coup d’état, Prospero is a usurper as well, enslaving native dwellers such local sprite Ariel (Elinor Gunn), and Caliban (guitarist JD Cullum). Caliban is half-man, half-monster, son of the witch Sycorax, who ruled the island but died before Prospero’s arrival. While Ariel willfully does Prospero’s bidding, either from love or a hope for her freedom, Caliban is a jealous nemesis who desperately wants his throne back.
Prospero, with Ariel’s undercover aid, has brewed up a massive storm to shipwreck onto his atoll his brother Antonio; Antonio’s accomplice and King of Naples, Alonzo (Adrian LaTourelle); Alonzo’s equally deceitful brother, Francisco (pianist John Allee); Prospero’s old ally, Gonzala (Saundra McClain); and Alonzo’s beloved but naïve son, Ferdinand (Peter Mendoza), who gets separated from the others only to meet cute with Miranda. Dimwitted crew members Trincula (Erin Pineda) and Stephano (LaTourelle) also wash up on shore and meet up with Caliban to take over the island from Prospero, but besotted hijinks may gum up their plan.
Taking cues from the likes of Mel Brooks and The Three Stooges, Doukas’s comedic timing is right on point. Designer Julie Keen outfits the actors in contemporary costumes that ably project the characters’ personalities and class standing. Foley designers Jeff Gardner, Doukas and sound designer Jeff Gardner have proffered some inventive tools for sound effects, too funny to name here. The composer John Ballinger’s songs and their renditions by drummer/percussionist John Harvey, Cullum, Allee, and others relate well to the story.
Racić and Mendoza make for a handsome couple, whose nimble maneuvering around mike stands is just one commendable bit of Doukas’s clever staging. Van Norden’s Prospero is stern yet loving and anchors the piece with his regal bearing and sonorous voice and all cast members, notably Gunn, have a firm handle on the vocals as well as the text.
If there is a message to be gleaned from all this frivolity, perchance it’s best delivered by McClain’s Gonzala in her heartfelt call for a land where there is “no use of service, of riches, or of poverty, no contracts . . . no occupation, all men idle, all. And women too. . . No sovereignty.”
The Antaeus Company, Kiki & David Gindler Performing Arts Center, 110 East Broadway, Glendale.; Mon. and Fri. – Sat., 8 p.m.; Sat. – Sun., 2 p.m.; through July 30. https://antaeus.org or (818) 506-1983
