Cymbeline

Shakespeare's Comic Gore
oh, the strutting and fretting upon the stage

Shakespeare's later plays (Tempest, The Winter's Tale) are often considered more somber and mythological. The audience has the privileged vantage of knowing things the characters don't. But Cymbeline is refreshingly funny during its most tragic and gruesome scenes. The general plot has all the traditional elements - a trapped princess and her lover are separated by the king, Cymbeline, fidelity is tested, lies told, poisons used and people thought dead. Throw in some cross-dressing, and evil queen/stepmother, two long-lost royal princes, and a battle with the Romans, and you've got more action and wardrobe changes than Elton John circa 1973. Of course I love the identity confusion caused by a rather humorously morbid decapitation - something Sam Raimi would be proud to imitate.

So, given all these great elements, and more stars on stage than you can see in the Manhattan night sky, what went wrong? I saw a fabulous production of Cymbeline in Seattle several years back - smaller stage, fewer ensemble members, but so much better. Simply stated, it was because the actors and director were obviously having fun, enjoying the play and all its absurdities and playful excesses. They played the roles with as little exaggeration or overt punctuation thus allowing the audience to revel in the content and quality of the scene. They also weren't drowning in silk brocade and orientally inspired, gilded sets. Martha Plimpton plays Imogen with roller coaster emotional intensity, her words mostly shouted at everyone. Michael Cerveris, as her lover Posthumous, is searching for something to sing in every moment on stage, and instead orates as if he's William Shatner in a Star Trek episode. The wicked queen (Phylicia Rashad) is either shrieking or spewing her lines with snake-like venom. And her son, Cloten, was so obnoxiously played as a horny and lascivious fool, pandering for laughs, that I wanted to toss some Valium into his mouth to calm his performance down. Jonathan Cake, with super-large stage presence (he's taller than everyone on-stage), does a fun job as the wagering Italian and he certainly wears a bath house towel sheet like a Grecian god. I really think only a few supporting cast members really appreciated the importance of understating a role. You expect such perfection from veterans like John Cullum as Cymbeline. But I was surprised by John Pankow's performance as the court servant; he delivered a solid performance over easy laughs and a cheeky delivery. Both were refreshingly confident and solid compared to the histrionics of the rest of the main cast. Ah, there is hope that Americans can deliver Shakespeare, we just need more of them.