Shakespeare Returns Home to the Park
Twelfth Night Offered At Delacorte Theater
Version by Papp Set at Turn of 20th Century
by Lewis Funke
The New York Times - August 14, 1969

NOTE: This review makes no mention, other than in the credits at the beginning, of Galt MacDermot's music in this production.

Twelfth Night, the Shakespeare play.  Staged by Joseph Papp;
setting by Douglas W. Schmidt; lighting by Martin Aronstein;
Costumes by Theoni V. Aldredge; songs and music by Galt MacDermot;
swordplay by Albert Quinton; artistic director Gerald Freeman;
production stage manager Michael Chambers.  presented by the New
York Shakespeare Festival, by Joseph Papp; associate producer
Bernard Gersten.  At the Delacorte Theater, Central Park,
West 81st Street.

Orsino.............................................................................Ralph Waite
Curio..........................................................................Philip C. Harris
Valentino.....................................................................Stephen Collins
Viola............................................................................Barbara Barrie
Sea Captain..................................................................Albert Quinton
Sir Toby Belch...............................................................Stephen Elliot
Maria..........................................................................Jennifer Darling
Sir Andrew Aguecheek...................................................Tom Aldredge
Feste..........................................................................Charles Durning
Olivia...................................................................Shasha von Scherler
Malvolio........................................................................Robert Ronan
Antonio........................................... .............................Albert Stratton
Sebastian..........................................................................Peter Simon
First Officer..............................................................Sam Tsoutsouvas
Second Officer..............................................................Paul McHenry
Priest...........................................................................Albert Quinton
Servants...................................................Bruce Cobb, Kevin Gardiner
Honor Guard...............Thomas Crawley, James De Marse, Patrick Shea
Musicians................Leonard Handler, John McCleod, Stephen Wilensky
 

Shakespeare got back into the New York Shakespeare Festival the other night.  Sidelines while Ibsen was holding the Delacorte Theater's stage earlier this summer, the Bard got back into a revival of his "Twelfth Night" officially unveiled on Tuesday.

To say that all's well in Illyria - Illyria, Central Park, U.S.A,, may be risky.  At this moment irate purists may be meeting in secret rendezvous, plotting action, perhaps even a demonstration in Sheep Meadow, against the traducers of tradition.  Whatever course they take, though, will be to no avail.  The odds are likely to be overwhelmingly against them judging by the appreciative and amused audience of which I was a member.  Though Joseph Papp, the founder and director of the festival, has taken liberties in his staging of one of Shakespeare's loveliest plays, they are not offenses against the text.

What liberties has he taken?  For one, instead of setting Illyria in the period of the early 17th century, which is when the play first was produced and is traditional, he has moved it to the turn of the present century Illyria.  The purists would have a point there.

Of the production as a whole they might contend that they missed the beauty of the poetry.  Mr. Papp has not stressed the poetic passages.  Instead, he's had his players portray their roles in naturalistic vein and speak their lines accordingly.  There is a definite conversational quality in this procedure and above all there is an emphasis on clarity of diction that allows an audience to understand virtually  every word.  Almost for this alone, there would have to be praise - there are some lovely words in "Twelfth Night".

Stressing diction seems to be in line, too, with Papp's rather deliberate pace for the play.  He seems to see it in terms of Checkovian pastels and finds its meaning for contemporary audiences in the fact that the pains and anguish suffered by those in "Twelfth Night" results from the concealment of true feelings.  Honesty, he thinks, is the essential policy in human relationships.

I caught glimpses of Mr. Papp's intentions through the performance.  But no matter.  "Twelfth Night" remains as cheerful an evening as it must have been back in 1602 when the barristers and benches saw it in Middle Temple Hall.  And Mr. Papp has cast if effectively.

Barbara Barrie, a festival veteran, is a winning Viola.  Impersonating Cesario, following her being shipwrecked off the Ilyrian coast, and serving as the courier from Orsino to the grieving Olivia, she is pert, sweet and winsome.  There is no question about the purity and beauty of Viola as Miss Barrie plays her, and she's most amusing as she participates in naval drills under the Duke's officers.  She is equally comic when confronted with the challenge to duel with Sir Andrew Aguecheek.

Both Stephen Elliot as Sir Toby Belch and Tom Aldredge as Sir Andrew make a fine comic team, more than willing to indulge in the occasional slapstick that Mr. Papp enjoys wielding in these productions.  Charles Durning's Feste is warm and pleasing and Robert Ronan is an adroit Malvolio, that self-loving, officious, prissy steward who is tricked into thinking Olivia is in love with him.

Maria, the trickster, is played with contagious gusto by Jennifer Darling.  Sasha von Scherler is attractive as Olivia and ralph Waite gives Orsino the correct mood of the foolish fellow pining over an unrequited love.

"Twelfth Night" will be at the Delacorte through Aug. 30 (no performances are scheduled for the 18th and 25th).  It makes Central Park especially attractive these summer nights.

Copyright The New York Times Company.  All rights reserved.

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