By Paul Esau (The Cascade) – Email
Print Edition: March 14, 2012
There is something innately funny (in any language) about people posing as members of the opposite gender, a universal truth that is heavily exploited in the UFV Theatre Department’s latest production of Shakespeare’s As You Like It. Why the heroine, Rosalind (Rebekah Brisco), is forced to spend much of the play dressed like man is as unclear as Shakespeare’s inclusion of a court fool in her travelling party, but the details are trivial compared to the comic potential. Thankfully, one of the great strengths of UFV’s current batch of student actors is their ability to convert such potential into comedic gold.
Banished by a troubled duke, pursued by a shrewish shepherdess, and pursuing a love-sick, somewhat over-virtuous Orlando (Dylan Coulter), Rosalind the man is the paradox around which the play revolves. Brisco plays her as an opinionated girl masking the difficulties of her gender-bending situation through enthusiastic belligerence, in stark contrast to her cousin and fellow court refugee Celia (Gabby Bohmer) who displays more traditionally feminine ideals. The perception of “gender” is deeply important in As You Like It, and the actor’s manifestations of gender transcend mere humour to question the male and female “role” beyond the stage. Some of it is stereotype, some is truth, and this reviewer will not presume to make the distinction.
Brisco is part of a trio of actors who define the audience’s collective memory of the performance, the others being Eli Funk (the fool Touchstone) and Gabriel Kirkley (the philosopher Jaques). Funk inhabits the difficult role of a comic whose jokes are centuries behind, yet compensates with spontaneously fresh (yet technically perfect) ridiculousness. His ribald wooing of the shepherdess Audrey (Cait Archer) is one of the highlights of the second act.
Kirkley tactfully handles what is arguably the strangest role in the entire play: the “melancholy fellow” wandering his pessimistic way through a Shakespearean comedy. It is his character, more than any other inclusion, which betrays the underlying seriousness of As You Like It, drawing whimsy from fate and fate from whimsy. At times mild, at others bitter, Kirkley’s characterization is fascinatingly understated and therefore successfully enigmatic.
The production is situated in the classical “Second Empire” period, set against austere columns and painted flora. The props and costumes are sparse compared to the violent exoticism of last semester’s Arabian Nights, but (with the possible exception of a fantastical deer-headed apparition in the second act) they artfully compliment the dialogue. Small touches—carding brushes for Josh Tompke’s shepherd, poems strung like prayer flags above the forest—add rustic and mystical appeal.
An important presence behind the scenes is that of Text Coach Erin Wells, whose expertise is immediately obvious when contrasting As You Like It to last year’s Shakespearean production The Tempest. The comprehensive incorporation of movement, gesture and action into the speech of the actors, coupled with much-superior phrasing, enables a noticeably more efficient translation of meaning to the audience. Some speeches in As You Like It hardly even sound Shakespearean, and that, from a layperson, is high praise indeed.
The strengths of this latest UFV production are in its life, its dynamism, and the relatable nature of its subject matter. Its weakness is perhaps its tendency to jump so quickly from the profane to the profound, from phallic jests involving shepherd’s staves to fantastical, fog-ridden visions. Yet, once again, UFV theatre has produced an enjoyable, thought-provoking work, and a good choice for an evening’s entertainment.
As You Like It plays March 15, 16, 17, 22, 23, and 24, with matinees on the 18 and 25. Tickets are between $9 and $20 and can be obtained by calling the theatre box office at 604-795-2814.
