Word: stage
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Dates: during 1960-1969
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...vision of Arden and the court that the good people over to Adams House are retailing these evenings is funny, fluid, and frequently elegant. Only a malcontent, wearier of world and stage than any Jaques, could carp very long on its one major failing: sometimes one can hardly see the Forest from the treat...
...text for production, As You Like It is something of a problem. It brims with sticky plot points and minor discrepancies. It sports a resolution more arbitrary than most. More important, much of its action hinges on Shakespeare's imitation and parody of a goodly number of Elizabethan stage conventions and philosophical commonplaces. Some of the comedy depends for its force on witty allusions, now sadly obscure...
...result is a definite success. The extent of the success is a measure both of the good theatrical judgment of Michaels and his company, and of the tremendous virtue of those elements of the text--the love plots, the broad verbal humor, and the many options for comic stage business--which this production plays...
...this essentially rural set fails to provide a wholly satisfactory backdrop for the scenes of court and town, it works wonders in transforming the less-than-congenial dining hall atmosphere into a proper stage. The use of an elaborate unit of limited flexibility benefits house theatre tremendously, even when it makes certain transformations impossible. The costumes demonstrate similar virtues: none are overlavish, all are colorful and consistent with the whole, and all show good period spirit. A surprising number of principals look handsome and easy in potentially difficult clothes...
...erratic in his attempts to use stage business in harness with Shakespeare's verbal wit or verbal wisdom. Often he finds success in pointing a line with a gesture, but sometimes too, his compositions are simply too full of movement for good focus. On a few occasions, he has literally obscured potentially funny or significant dialog by drawing the audience's attention to some simultaneous comic bit. In a single instance, he shows an excess of reverence to the lines, freezing an admirably raucous forest banquet to a tableau, while Jaques (Kenneth Tiger) puts the "Seven Ages of Men" through...