Theater Review: “As You Like It” in Central Park
By: Marion DS Dreyfus
Let us say at the outset that Shakespeare in the Park is a 5-decade treasure, a gift to the millions of New Yorkers and visitors who attend unfailingly, summer after summer, paying only the few hours needed on a queue for the 2,000 tickets per performance, with two plays per summer season.
But let us note that the seasons now are far different from those initiated by Joseph Papp, innovator of the Park productions over 50 years ago.
Now, you are quite as likely to see a Richard III as a black woman without a hump as a male king with the visible perhaps metaphorical hunch that defines his mood and temperament as you are to see a Lear being a female thespian noted for her asperity—but all that aside, we have watched the seasonal deliquescence of authenticity of waves of summer offerings.
This is not to say that directors cannot on occasion fiddle with the cast, as is their right. thus there was a cast member in “Richard III” some months ago in a wheelchair, and that was both innovative and welcome.
But up-datings of 16th century dramas into gangsta eras, or the prostitution of original Shakespearian-tempo theatricality to a contemporary hair salon in Harlem—when comes a complaint? Must we bend, ever, to the expectations of the commonest, possibly lowest common denominator in order to pander to a full house?
The present offering, “As You Like It,” has its known quirks and affectations, its inbred humor and humours, but they are eclipsed by the community casting and revanchings of this production, slated for a few more appearances before it sunsets.
Sadly, Shakespeare in the Park long acceded to the ravaging effects of PC tosh.
“As You Like It,” now playing in Central Park, has a huge cast of some 60 neighborhood folk, with /not a single Caucasian evident in the lineup, though it features many ultra-large (as is the custom of late) and a few elderly (that is a plus, it would seem), as well as many talented singers and dancers from the five boroughs and various community organizations. They sing (credibly), they dance (energetically); they prance, they commit gay-ish notions–but whatever else they offer, it is not Shakespeare we’re seeing. It’s something, yes, but if one is expecting the words and setting of the Bard, you’ll be seeking in vain.
Despite our disappointment, kudos to the director for handling his large-crowd raves and set-pieces, for the amusing and smooth functioning of the cunning sets arising from below, for the functional and divertingly colorful set of ribbon-festooned trees and lights. And for the melodic medley of many songs and furbelows of introduced dances and histrionic costumery–even if we could well have managed without the ‘royal guard’ done up in radical ghetto attire of radical Leftery.
This ‘comedy’ is As SOME Like It. Most in the packed audience seemed to eat it up.
But it is emphatically not Shakespeare.
