Stage Review - Three Musketeers, Romeo & Juliet, Twelfth Night (OSF)

Stage Review - Three Musketeers / Romeo & Juliet / Twelfth Night
Presented By: Oregon Shakespeare Festival (OSF), Ashland, OR
Date Reviewed: Friday / Saturday, July 14/15, 2023
Reviewed By: Greg Heilman

A trip to Ashland to experience the Oregon Shakespeare Festival (OSF) is like getting a concentrated dose of theatre, one that needs a little bit of water, or in this case time, added to it to be truly appreciated. My recent trek to OSF resulted in three shows in a 24-hour span, though truth be told if I had stayed one more day I could have added another. That particular weekend I went, I had to choose between The Three Musketeers, Romeo & Juliet, Twelfth Night, and Rent, but I only had time for three, so I had to eliminate one. Alas, Rent fell below the line, mainly for two reasons. Firstly, a few companies are presenting Rent here in the Puget Sound area this coming season, and second, if I’m going to something with the name “Shakespeare” in its name, I’m going to choose something by, well, Shakespeare. Three shows in that short amount of time is a lot, and as I sat down to review each individually, I kept coming back to the commonalities among the shows, how they relate to each other, and how I couldn’t really discuss one without at least mentioning the others.. With OSF, it feels like there is a thread connecting all of the shows, one that starts with the venues (each venue supports two simultaneous productions), weaves through the cast and crew, many of which can be seen in multiple productions, and ends in a bow that is a manifestation of the company’s philosophy, one that states the “organization is committed to co-liberation through radically inclusive, accessible, and collaborative practices”. It is through that lens that I decided the best way to review each individual show is to look at them together..

Each of the shows that I attended is an adaptation of some degree. The Three Musketeers, for example, is an all new original production from playwright Kirsten Childs and directed by Kent Gash. This production grew from a seed, one stemming from the single idea that while the original writer of The Three Musketeers, Alexander Dumas was of mixed race, none of the portrayals of this story were diverse in any way. Kent worked with Kirsten to develop something that he believes is more like what Dumas imagined when he was writing the story, which was published in 1844. After all, we write what we know, and Dumas’ father was a highly decorated military officer, and one of color, so when Dumas wrote The Three Musketeers, and wrote it taking much inspiration from his father, it’s safe to say the version in his mind was just a tad more diverse than what’s been seen on screen over the years. The result is something that, while based on the original novel, feels new and modern. Romeo and Juliet, also an adaptation, sticks more closely to the original Shakespearean text than, say, The Three Musketeers does to Dumas’, but much like Musketeers was created to present an alternative viewpoint. Romeo and Juliet takes the traditional story and uses setting and design to tell director Nataki Garrett’s story. Early in Nataki’s life, she recognized in Shakespeare a rhythm and a soul that not many have captured in their tellings. She also recognized some similarities in the collective plights of the Capulets and Montegues to those she witnessed first hand growing up some of the less affluent areas of Oakland. As a result, she’s taken the traditional story of the star crossed lovers from feuding families and dives deeper into what may have caused their rift in the first place, focusing on economic disparity in an urban setting, Oakland to be precise, in the shadow of the Bay Bridge. What Nataki has done here is made Romeo and Juliet even more layered, taking a classic story, one that is the true definition of a tragedy, and added a modern take that transforms it into something introspective and thought provoking, and most certainly relatable. Finally, Twelfth Night. In what feels like something that story-wise and dialogue-wise are most closely aligned with Shakespeare’s original work, it’s the styling that sets this production apart. Set in the Jazz age, this vision for Twelfth Night is just beautiful, the costumes and set pieces transporting the audience out of the heat of the summer night in Ashland, OR to the different kind of heat in the blues and jazz clubs of the 1930s. Director Dawn Monique Williams takes the story of Olivia, victim of a shipwreck and new to Illyria, who disguises herself as a man to find work, and subsequently becomes entangled in a bizarre love triangle and dresses it up superbly. She also takes the themes of gender and identity in Twelfth Night and brings the front and center in a way that is thought provoking and respectful.

Each of these shows is an example of how directors and playwrights can use classic pieces and bring them into a new age, forgoing the reinvention of the wheel and moving toward art that is relatable and engaging for a modern audience. Each are used here as a vehicle for making a point, or telling a story from a new perspective, and each have varying levels of success in the way they present their stories. Twelfth Night is perhaps the best of the lot. Dawn Monique Williams has used the stylings of the Jazz Age and presents a very polished version of this classic. Edward E. Haynes, Jr.’s scenic design, Melissa Torchia’s costumes, and Sarah Hughley’s lighting together are transformative in this production. Add to that the musicality of the piece, credit here not only going to Everett Elton Bradman’s wonderful composition and sound design, but very much to Arielle Crosby’s delivery as Feste, but more on that later. Nataki Garrett has also done something similar with her direction of Romeo and Juliet. Here it’s Nina Ball’s scenic design that is at the fore, delivering Nataki’s vision in location and setting. It really does feel like the Capulets and Montegues are in Oakland. The Angus Bowmer Theatre provides a little more flexibility with sets and staging than does the Allen Elizabethan, and this creative team has done a wonderful job taking advantage of that, including Xavier Pierce’s lighting and T. Carlis Roberts’ sound design and music direction. This is a very good production, though if I had to challenge anything, it might be the overuse of humor, especially in the first act. Don’t get me wrong, Shakespeare is known for using humor to set the audience up in his tragedies, lightening the mood so that the punch to the gut hits even harder when it comes, such as when a beloved character meets an untimely death. This is clearly the goal here, but I feel like some of the Act 1 humor is so over the top that it takes away from the seriousness of the love affair between Romeo and Juliet. It makes the stakes feels not as high when tragedy does inevitably strike. Other than that, Nataki’s vision for what she’s trying to do with this adaptation is delivered wonderfully.

The Three Musketeers is the most challenging for me, at least when it comes to the storytelling. I simply feel like it is trying to do too much, or take too much on. The play does hit on all the major plot points of the original story, D’Artagnan traveling to Paris in hopes of joining the Musketeers of the Guard, only to be initially turned away though gaining the confidence of three of the Musketeers, Porthos, Aramis, and Athos. This adaptation brings the story’s author Dumas in as an actual character here, as the de facto narrator of the piece. He’s the narrator, but he’s also woven into the storytelling. I like the idea of this in principle, it provides a little context into the background of the adaptation, but there are some pieces built around this aspect that cause a little consternation. In addition to Dumas, the audience is introduced to his father, the highly decorated French general Thomas-Alexandre Dumas, whom the author seeks advice from early on in the show. This plot arc feels disjointed, especially when the story of grinds to a halt while Dumas seeks his father’s council. Thinking that this is going to be something recurring throughout, it really only happens a few times, and then is used as a tool to wrap the story up at the end, making the actual telling of The Three Musketeers feel like it’s a play within a play. Additionally, there’s a sequence early on, where Dumas as narrator describes the character Milady as “fair-haired”, but being a diverse cast, comprised predominantly of people of color, she most certainly is not. Milady throws a look at Dumas, utters “It’s your world” (or something to that effect), to which he replies, “Thank you for telling me something I already know”, which is a creative turn and a bit of a comical one, and one that presumably gives Dumas some creative slack in the telling. Fast forward to later in the show when Milady breaks into a musical number which contradicts her “It’s your world” comment altogether, challenging the originality of Dumas’ story and taking him to task for imparting his viewpoint on the characters. It’s a fair challenge, of course, and Milady’s viewpoint is well heard and received, however it’s another layer on top of what is already a multi-faceted piece of storytelling, and one that given all of what the play is trying to do and say, feels not just like it’s wedged into the second act, but also that it’s trying too hard to make another point. The Three Musketeers would be better served to remove one or two of those extra layers so that they others can shine a bit more brightly and get the full attention they deserve.

None of that is to say that The Three Musketeers, or any of the other shows, are not well done or well acted. They all most certainly are well produced and exceptionally acted. Each scenic design and all of the creative pieces around them are wonderful and bring the artistic visions of the individual directors to life in a professional and attractive way. I’m also extremely impressed with the level of talent onstage, especially from those who are leading multiple shows, or have predominant roles in one show while acting as an understudy for a large role in another. Case in point, Jamyl Dobson. Jamyl is Alexander Dumas in The Three Musketeers, and was also called upon to step into the role of Orsino in Twelfth Night. These are major, and wholly different, roles, and Jamyl’s performances in both are top notch. Other examples include Eunice Woods as Milady in The Three Musketeers and Olivia in Twelfth Night, and David Anthony Lewis as the elder Montegue in Romeo and Juliet and Sir Aguecheek (as well as the Priest) in Twelfth Night. The casts are chock full of actors doing double and sometimes triple duty, and each performance is just as good as the last. There are so many good performances here, it’s difficult to single any out, but perhaps there are none better than Arielle Crosby as Feste and Al Espinosa as Malvolio in Twelfth Night. Arielle is just wonderful in her portrayal of Feste and I challenge anyone to find a more soulful singing voice than hers. Al’s Malvolio seems at first to be an afterthought, especially in the context of the story’s love triangle, but later, upon finding a forged letter from Maria and acting on it in a way that literally brings the house down, his character becomes more central in the story, and Al’s portrayal steals the show.

Any theatre lover should, at one point or another in their lives, especially if you’re on the West Coast, make the trek to Ashland to take in the Oregon Shakespeare Festival. This organization is chock full of creative talent and is bringing classic work into the 21st Century, while at the same time featuring modern and up and coming pieces of performing art. And while the three shows I took in, The Three Musketeers, Romeo and Juliet, and Twelfth Night, are each at different levels of maturity, it’s a treat to see so much talent both on and off stage come together to move us all forward.

The Three Musketeers runs onstage in the Allen Elizabethan Theatre at the Oregon Shakespeare Festival through October 14, Romeo & Juliet in the Angus Bowmer Theatre through October 15, and on the Allen Elizabethan stage through October 13. For more information about these shows, the Oregon Shakespeare Festival, and its other and upcoming productions, and to purchase tickets, visit https://www.osfashland.org/.

Photo credit: Jenny Graham