Merely Players

As You Like It at the Delacorte Theater in Central Park

            Is there any quote of William Shakespeare’s that more defines him than the monologue of the Seven Ages as humbly pronounced by Jacques, depressed courtier in As You Like It (playing through June 30 as part of Shakespeare in the Park)?  In the somewhat cynical but certainly accurate summation of the lives and purpose of the ambling human race, Jacques (a name pronounced, like “Rosalind,” an infinite number of ways) proclaims, “All the world’s a stage, and all the men and women merely players: They have their exits and their entrances; and one man in his time plays many parts.”  (This Jacques, incidentally, is played by a heavily disguised and appropriately funny Stephen Spinella.)  It would of course be cliché and redundant, perhaps even too much so to bear in any critical explanation of a work by Shakespeare, to explore the relation of the nuances of this speech to the Bard himself and his outlook on life.  So I’ll just remind you, as you take in this new production, to eat, drink, and be merry!  This is a comedy, after all.

            And there is little introspection, to make way for good tidings, dance, and happiness all ‘round at this version of As You Like It, the first production of this summer’s Shakespeare in the Park.  The woods feature prominently in the summer’s chosen entertainments (Sondheim’s Into the Woods is to follow in August), and As You Like It is, of course, no exception, as it deals with the government-in-exile of the good Duke Senior (Andre Braugher of The Wire fame), banished from his dukedom by his wicked, top-hatted brother, Frederick (also Braugher).  Senior’s new court is to be found in the Forest of Arden, where unrequited love flourishes, takes hold of any willing participants, and eventually (spoiler alert) is requited after all.  The onstage antics are accompanied by a rousing and extremely entertaining bluegrass score by Steve Martin—with lyrics by an unknowing Shakespeare, whose rhyming prose is employed by a jubilant troupe of performers.   Yes, bluegrass, for in this incarnation As You Like It takes place in the Civil War-era American South.  Costumes and locations (designed, respectively, by the Tony-nominated Jane Greenwood and the Tony-winning John Lee Beatty) are changed, but the prose remains the same, and most theatergoers wouldn’t have it any other way.  The comedies, and As You Like It in particular, are uncomplicated, joyous, and entertaining, not to mention funny, and when delivered with a cast of players like Lily Rabe (daughter of David Rabe and the late Jill Clayburgh and veteran of the original cast of Seminar) as a feisty Rosalind; Oliver Platt portraying a sly Touchstone the clown; and as many other talented Shakespeareans as can fit on a stage at one time, such a play as this can be transcendently good.  It’s no surprise that this one is.

            A play like this one, that can survive the test of time and remain appropriately comical, deserves recognition and performance.  It especially deserves the kind of performance that whips the audience into a frenzy, hands clapping, feet stomping, and funny bones tickled at the loves between Orlando (David Furr) and Rosalind (or Ganymede), Silvius (Will Rogers) and Phoebe (Susannah Flood), Touchstone and Audrey (Donna Lynne Champlin)—Well, there’s a lot of love onstage.  And the audience, too, can feel it wash over them.

            It’s a wonderful thing to watch dedicated actors perform Shakespeare, because it’s obvious that they love it so much.  To speak the words of the greatest writer ever to live is a privilege, and the actors at the Delacorte Theater embrace that.  They speak with passion and power, and when watching them one gets the feeling that every audience member, too, is merely playing a part in a long and extensive Shakespeare work; that he has written your life, so to speak, and that your parts, your exits and your entrances, are only an extension of the work you’ve just seen performed.  A play as all-encompassing as that, one that manages to mirror real life from over four centuries in the past, could only be written by William Shakespeare.  Who better to celebrate?