Questions About Shakespeare

AS THE CURTAIN RISES, someone is pounding out Scott Joplin and vaudeville tunes on the upright piano in the corner. Credits appear like titles from a 1910 silent movie: "Executive Producer--John Cooper; Director--Evangeline Morphos; Set Designer--Martin Shofner." The Hasty Pudding Theater has been transformed into a nickelodeon for Measure for Measure. the premiere production of The Harvard Shakespeare Theater. It's an extraordinary and ambitious first appearance.

The play they present is not an easy one to produce, but quite obviously, a lot of people gave it a lot of work. The sets are lavish; the costumes (by Elizabeth Tudor) are beautiful and exquisitely detailed. Drawn entirely from the Harvard "community" almost every actor fills his part--most are better than competent. Measure for Measure is worth seeing, but once the production inspires you to start thinking about it, you can hardly stop. Half the pleasure of experiencing Shakespeare--off the shelf and on the stage--is in asking questions. Since this production lacks strong, cohesive direction, its potential ideas remain potential. Questioning is bound to become argument.

Take the nickelodeon, for instance. It is a stylish device, as are all the devices of this production, but besides relieving the tedium of set changes, what does it do here? Why impose a device from a cliched art form of the early 20th century on a chosen 19th century setting of a 16th century play?

This production is firmly rooted in the 19th century, transplanted from timeless Vienna to Vienna 1980. The selection of this time period may not have been random, although it is an ultimately undeveloped idea. Specific trends in the Vienna of that time have relevance to the themes of the play. In late 19th century Vienna, many bourgeois marriages had become business contracts of respectability, driving wives to hysteria on Freud's couch and husbands to other reclining positions. One Viennese citizen says prostitution was "the dark underground vault over which rose the gorgeous structure of middle class society with its faultless radiant facade." Similarly in the story of Measure for Measure lechery runs rampant in Vienna. The Duke of the city pretends to leave, deputizing an icily moral Lord Angelo to govern in his place. The Duke hopes prostitution will be curbed this way. Angelo, true to form, immediately shuts the whorehouses, and condemns a man to death for fornication. But Claudio, the accused, has been living unmarried with his loving, contracted fiance only until her dowry can be arranged. Their union needs no financial guarantee. Measure is not for Measure in Angelo's sentence; the penalty does not fit the crime. Every sexual union is a form of prostitution in this play until what could be called the happy ending, when four legitimate betrothals are made between appropriate partners.

AT THE CORE of the play is Angelo's realization of his sexuality. He presents a deal to Claudio's sister, Isabella, a strictly moral novice, who is called from her convent to argue on her brother's behalf. He tells her she can prostitute herself to him in exchange for her brother's life, or she can allow Claudio to die. Isabella never actually chooses between the alternatives. The Duke has been nearby all the while masquerading as a friar. He helps Isabella trick Angelo, furthering his own purpose of determining "if power change purpose...what our seemers be."

The set links historical Vienna to the Vienna of Shakespeare. The opening scene, set in a house of ill repute, resembles a giant sewer. We are down low, beneath ponderous vaults, looking into endless black caverns. But those same vaults function as the huge window frames in Angelo looks, the heavy frame vaults serve as a reminder of the seamy underside he struggles to repress.

Greg Landis as Angelo incorporates these contrasts into his performance. At first, he is a perfect authority figure--repressed, civilized, unshakeable, Eventually, his sensuality can no longer be denied, and he goes mad with desire. But that too is reined. His performance is all the more impressive for the credibility of his subsequent tortured hypocrisy.

Unfortunately, these themes of hypocrisy and sincerity, sex and love, so strongly introduced, are left dangling. The 19th century setting is as much an imposition and as little a genuine idea as the nickelodeon. Part of the problem is Jennifer Marre's interpretation of Isabella. If only it had been a little less inexplicable, more seemingly affected by the thought of sexual violation or even by the threat of her brother's execution. Isabella is not necessarily selfishly chaste; especially in the setting of this production, Marre might have been directed to make evident that it is a different sort of martyrdom to consent to rape than to whipping. Marre does not need to treat her brother's condemnation as something simply exasperating. And if she is being icy and holier-than-thou--well, snootiness does not constitute the sin of pride.

THE MAIN FAULT in the play lies in the direction. Even as 19th century Vienna does not give the production a cohesive structure, so over and over again, the director misses opportunities for immediate dramatic power. In the last act, when Isabella seeks vengeful justice from the Duke, she perfunctorily genuflects as the addresses him. That little gesture steals significance from the way she breaks down and later begs the Duke on her knees to show mercy to Angelo. And this is only one of many thoughtlessly staged scenes.

Still, although the direction is weak, other elements carry the show. At once commanding and warm, Thomas Champion has the necessary stature for the good-natured, safety-net God of a Duke, a ruler who visits his people in disguise, manipulating their lives as much when incognito as when in regalia.

Peter Stein as a bawd gives one of the best performances of the evening. He had oily charm and a comic ability to keep his head when those about are losing theirs. Stein's Pompey is an ordinary fellow but for the faint stench of evil about him. He is funny without being simple.

George Miller, no the other hand, as a friend of Claudio, is funny despite the fact that he's too complex. We keep thinking what's an intelligent person like this doing playing our comic relief?

Not too many questions are answered by this production of Measure for Measure. The play, however, is a remarkable first venture, a well-performed play despite its direction. The Pudding theater is a good stage for any group to exploit, more comfortable and ample for the audience than Agassiz, for instance. An organization devoted to Shakespeare is not a bad idea, either. The bard is in no way too rarefied for rah-rah spirit. And great plays should be as accessible and as polished as possible; even when full potential is not reached, the production is always interesting in the true sense of the word. That's what makes plays similar to music and more exciting than film. Plays can be done (not analyzed, but done!) again and again and never be definitive.