Word: titania
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...text--except for an amusing pre-marital spat between Theseus and Hippolyta that makes some dramatic sense but seems only marginally present in Shakespeare's original. Everywhere else, the conflicts in this production neatly fit into a world thrown out of kilter by the feud between Oberon and Titania, the presiding deities. The explosive initial entrance of the lovers and Egeus, grunting and panting, or the encounter between Puck and one of Titania's fairies, each bristling, spitting and snarling like primates in some mating ritual--scenes like these present a quarrel-lust that grips like a disease and only...
...characterization of the upper and lower orders of the fairy-world matches. Kenneth Ryan's Oberon pompously barks his lengthy speeches as if entranced by their weight; Carmen de Lavallade's Titania flexes her body in superhuman ways and says more with it than most performers manage with the help of Shakespeare's verse; the quartet of fairies in her train--dressed in skintight body suits, adorned with tails and extended fingers--is menacingly inhuman. Their lullaby for the sleeping queen, miles distant from both Mendelssohn and Purcell, sounds exactly like a chorus of watchful insects...
...eyelids of the dreamers at the wrong time as it is the master-hand of the Bard. It is he who wakens the star-vexed lovers and sets them in pursuit of those who will scornfully spurn them. It is he who inspires the Queen of the Fairies, Titania (Maggie Smith), to dote in adoration on Bottom (Alan Scarfe) after the head of an ass has been grafted...
...center of the new Adams-Quincy House production of A Mid-summer Night's Dream is the lush poetry of Shakespeare and images of reverie and nightmare woven together carefully, like a speall. In Titania's bower, the faries who also appear as courtiers in the opening coreographed scenes and set the eerie tone of the show, develop insect-like personalities. And in a long, wicked laugh, the dark underside of Puck is revealed. The elaborate production has been weaved together by the people who brought The Beggar's Opera to Adams House last year. In the stage's flood...
...scenes that follow--the introduction of Puck, the quarrel of Titania and Oberon, and the bumbling of five Athenian workmen rehearsing a play in the woods--are gems of acting and direction. In fact, the acting in this production is without exception good. Dan Breslin gives an outstanding performance as the hyperenergetic, cackling Puck, flawlessly capturing the playful and devilish facets of Puck's mischief. Teresa Barger as Hermia and Joanna Blum as Helena are very much the respectively sought-after and frustrated lovers, and vice-versa. Anne B. Clarke as Titania fairly wafts across the stage. Tim Reuben...