Word: gentlemen
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MASTER THAT HE WAS, Shakespeare still didn't begin his career writing masterpieces, and The Two Gentlemen of Verona gives proof to that. In the past, critics spent a good deal of time trying to prove that "someone else" had written the parts of this play that are confusing, stiff, or downright silly. But even Shakespeare was once young and fallible, and this play is generally accepted now as a very early--if not the first--work of a great writer still marshalling his powers...
True, even bad Shakespeare outdistances most of the pack, and Two Gentlemen could work onstage given sensitive direction and excellent acting. But most companies wisely steer clear of this play and opt for better known and better loved works that can carry their own weight. A performance of Two Gentlemen, in its original form (a musical version was produced here two years ago), is a justifiably rare bird...
Unfortunately, The Boston Shakespeare Company's production of Two Gentlemen falls headlong into the traps set by the flawed script. If many of Shakespeare's works invite reinterpretation, this one almost demands it. However, director William Lacey opts for a traditional construction of the script, playing much of it merely for laughs, and thus fails to adequately explore the darker side of the comedy or compensate for its flaws...
...flaws lie in Shakespeare's clumsy handling of the central plot. The two gentlemen, Proteus and Valentine, represent two conventional types of young Renaissance men: Proteus, the languid romantic, and Valentine, the seeker after honor. In the first scene, Valentine chides Proteus for wasting his youth on love and idleness before sailing for Milan to attend the Emperor--who later turns out to be a Duke in an odd but minor discrepancy. After an interlude with Proteus's lover, Julia, Shakespeare has Proteus sent off to Milan to follow in Valentine's footsteps...
Unfortunately, the director's overall interpretation of Two Gentlemen as a light-hearted, guileless pastoral undercuts the good performances by imposing shallowness on the production. When even the senex irotus figures chase after serving maids the integrity of the play gets undermined and the whole thing tends toward farce...