By Chuck Graham, TucsonStage.com
photo by Tim Fuller
Oberon (Christopher Johnson) keeps an eye on fairies in his kingdom, as well as (foreground) Titania (Carley Elizabeth Preston) talking sweetly to Bottom (Joseph McGrath) who has the head of a donkey.
The most lively and imaginative production of a Shakespeare play you will likely ever see is “A Midsummer Night's Dream” playing at The Rogue Theatre through May 14.
Cynthia Meier as both director and costume designer has pulled out all the stops to prove, as the Bard himself suggested, that the power and pleasure of love is best experienced as fantasy.
Is he saying true love doesn't exist? Maybe. First you must want to believe, though, which is what always kick starts the fantasy.
An important part of this onstage imagineering begins in the layered stage design by Joseph McGrath. Stretched across the back of the stage and always in the shadows is a huge rose design, accented by a sliver of moon. Among the tall trees standing around the edge in darkness are many glowing animal eyes and flashes of fireflies.
Also a part of this forest are the flickering fairies in their fanciful costumes sprouting magical fairy wings that continually catch the light with random sparkles. In the program is a note that these uniquely shimmering wings come from a little workshop in western Ukraine.
Completing this poetic aura where anything seems possible are flutist Diana Schaible and harpist Rebecca Foreman. They perform an original score by composer and conductor Russell Ronnebaum in musical styles of the 16th century.
Within this heartfelt theatrical framework thrive all those moments that have made this play – first performed in 1595 or 1596 – the most popular of Shakespeare's plays today.
Based in an imaginary Athens of yore, the action begins promptly when Theseus (Christopher Johnson) and Hippolyta (Carly Elizabeth Preston) confront an angry claim entangling Hermia (Bryn Booth), Helena (Chelsea Bowdren), Demetrius (Aaron Shand) and Lysander (Zachary Austin).
Among the highlights of this remarkable production, Hermia and Helena hit an emotional peak as competing rivals in their extended gutsy argument over (of course) Demetrius and Lysander.
Preston carries the signature scene of “A Midsummer Night's Dream” when she as the fairy queen Titania is put under a spell by Puck (Hunter Hnat) to fall in love with “an ass” in a man's body and a donkey's head, the cursed actor Nick Bottom (McGrath).
Hnat plays it lively but straight as Puck, with no clowning aspects. He is serious about his magic.
However, the mock theater company of six actors within a theater company are hilarious, led by Bottom, taking their dramatic thespian skills to an advanced degree of ineptitude in this play within a play intended to celebrate the royal wedding of Theseus and Hippolyta.
Welcomed at the very happy ending by a standing ovation, Shakespeare's magic was in full force. The month of May couldn't have a better introduction.
Performances continue through May 14 at 7:30 p.m. Thursdays through Saturdays, plus 2 p.m. matinees Saturdays and Sundays, at The Rogue Theatre in the Historic Y, 300 E. University Blvd.
Tickets are $42. For details, reservations and current COVID protocol, phone 520-551-2053 or visit theroguetheatre.org
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