An antidote to many ills, laughter can offer relief as well as joy. It also tends to be most therapeutic and satisfying when shared with others. For the next few weeks, you’ll find a laughter gold mine on that little slip of land jutting into the lake known as Navy Pier. By envisioning one of the Bard’s best loved comedies through a very different lens, Chicago Shakespeare Theater has taken a masterpiece and given it a gleaming new sheen.
Shakespeare being Shakespeare, there are plenty of plot twists and one-of-a-kind characters to keep your imagination zooming in this stellar rendering of Twelfth Night. Thanks to sensational direction and a golden cast, we see how easily the road to love can lead to the most unexpected places and unions. Along the way, Shakespeare reveals as only he can the drive we all have for the fulfillment of mutual affection. It doesn’t matter what corner of the globe we hail from or our age, gender or status; cravings for close connection are universal. That truth may be one of the reasons why director Tyrone Phillips chose to abandon merry old England as his setting for this Twelfth Night. Instead, he placed it in a locale where the first-generation Jamaican American has a closer association, the Caribbean. The look and timbre of the play may change but the core message remains pristine. In some ways it may even have been intensified. And in this iteration, the change in scenery seems to have opened tremendous opportunities for character development and expression.
Shipwrecked and stranded, Viola (Jaeda LaVonne) is glad to be alive. She despairs the loss of her brother during the disaster and soon realizes she has to make her own way if she’s to survive. Because she knows her gender places her at a steep disadvantage, she disguises herself as a male and becomes Cesario. Soon, she not only finds herself in the employ of a nobleman, Orsino (Yao Dogbe), she becomes his trusted confidante. It doesn’t take her long to realize she’s in love with Orsino; giving her two thorny complications to contend with. In her role as a woman pretending to be a man, LaVonne plays the part with a guilelessness and sincerity that’s wholly and wonderfully ingratiating. Her performance radiates the innocence of youth just as its about to cross a transformative threshold. It also offers the perfect counterbalance to the outsize personalities that will eventually emerge in the play.
Personalities like Olivia (Christiana Clark), her uncle Sir Toby Belch (Ronald L. Conner) and his best bud Sir Andrew Aguecheek (Alex Goodrich). In deep mourning for her own brother doesn’t stop Olivia from being a very potent force of nature. Regal, commanding and accustomed to being obeyed, she reads as a despot with a spectacular voice in a Versace gown. Duke Orsino is nonetheless obsessed with her and determined to have her as his wife. Relentless partiers who’re usually inebriated, her uncle and Sir Andrew like to keep it light and play off one another like gifted vaudevillians. Much to the audience’s delight, they have nothing to do with anything serious and prefer the sweet release of song and dance to get the through the day.
Outlandish entanglements and outrageous confusion keep building to create a deliciously complex farcical stew. When Orsino sends cross-dressing Viola as his go-between to Olivia, she falls for what she sees as a very well-spoken, attractive young man. So smitten is Olivia that she’s willing to engage subterfuge to win over the imposter.
Adding yet another layer of romantic intrigue to the pyre, one of Olivia’s maids has decided to pull a prank on Olivia’s pompous manservant, Malvolio (Paul Oakley Stovall). He finds a note that implies Olivia has romantic interests in him. Malvolio has only to follow the instructions in the note to signal his corresponding affection for her and rise to lord of the manor. A veteran actor, and a co-producer of the Tony Award winning Strange Loop, Stovall turns his Malvolio into a master stroke of superb acting. Adapting his imposing stature and sonorous voice to comedy accentuated the absurdist realism of the play. It was nearly as delightful watching the faces of other people in the audience respond to his character as it was to see Stovall’s Malvolio unfurl. An added treat arrived when Malvolio, having been thrown in a dungeon as a result of his deception, laments his plight. The words he speaks to himself ring with the sincerity of true despair and count as one of the best dramatic performances anyone can hope to witness.
With Shakespeare and his comedies, it’s not so much a matter of whether things sort themselves out. The question has much more to do with how. Doppelgangers and happy chances are known to swoop in and save the day. In this Twelfth Night, Phillips and his precocious cast have also added a megaton of energy to make this production fly like a rocket. You never envision a clown or jester as suave, but Israel Erron Ford as Feste is as shrewdly canny as he is funny. He’s also blessed with a sumptuous voice that mesmerizes regardless of the style of music or tempo he’s singing. On this Caribbean island, the language may be Elizabethan, but the musical segues are decidedly contemporary; aligning the performance even more closely to the sensibilities of the audience. There are other touches, some tiny and some more flagrant, that snap this show firmly into the present day.
Both Sydney Lynne’s set design and Christine Pascual’s costumes lean more toward the evocative; ensuring the dialogue and the action remain the center of focus. When considering some of the sartorial choices of Sirs Toby and Andrew, there are exceptions. Regardless of your state of mind when the curtain rises, you’re guaranteed to be strolling on a cloud at the end of a performance that’ll leave you craving for more.
Twelfth Night
Through December 3, 2023
Chicago Shakespeare Theater
800 E. Grand Street/Navy Pier
Chicago, IL 60611
Tickets: www.chicagoshakes.com
