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'Romeo and Juliet' By Robert H. Miller Special to the Tidings An enemy loved is a powerful theme in literature, no better exemplified than in Shakespeare's "Romeo and Juliet," which opened Oregon Shakespeare Festival's 2003 season last Friday in the Angus Bowmer Theatre. It's my favorite of all his plays. This, the eleventh version since 1936 has an undeniably contemporary beat. Is calling it stunning going too far? Certainly it eclipses the earlier OSF productions (1988 and 1996) that I saw, neither of which I cared for, that took all sorts of liberties. Perhaps if I hadn't seen Franco Zeffirelli's production at the Orpheum Theatre on South Broadway in Los Angeles in the early 1960s - intensely atmospheric, sun-baked, and Italianate - I might be more receptive to modern treatments. Well, along comes director Loretta Greco to rattle my cage, to give us a "Romeo and Juliet" that is theatrically thrilling and bold. She even does away with swords - and I've always been a sucker for swordfights - substituting switch-blade knives and guns. She is immensely well served by the scenic design of Robert Brill. He uses two huge white placards, one bearing in bold black letters the words "IN FAIR" and on the other "VERONA," separating them with the dial of a clock (it later becomes the face of Juliet). He transforms the stage's surface into what resembles marble and employs commendable ingenuity when a section rises up from time to time to become Juliet's balcony, her bedchamber, or the tomb. Then, Friar Laurence, who is often confined to a cell, here pops up from below stage climbing an enchanting winding staircase surrounded by plants. And during the elegantly costumed masque - one of the highlights of the production - Capulet descends sitting on a large ring that would seem more appropriate for a musical, though here a dance swirls on (composer and sound design by Todd Barton). Later, Juliet sits aloft on it. The lighting design by James Vermeulen enhances the production at every turn, and notably in the masque. I do not mean to over-emphasize the scenic and lighting aspect to the exclusion of the actors. There are many fine performances. Kevin Kenerly is a boyish, playful, and ardent Romeo, and Nancy Rodriguez a tender, adorable, slyly humorous Juliet. How exquisite are their touch of hands and gentle kisses when they first meet at the masque. Other scenes tingle with passion, and their death is shattering. Andrea Frye is richly ribald and funny as Juliet's nurse, but also she lets us see her caring nature. I liked Duane Boutt� as Mercutio, a lean and lithe actor with magnetism, new to OSF, whose death saddens. There's good work by another newcomer, Ramiz Alexi Monsef as Peter, servant to Juliet's nurse, and Jos Viramontes makes his embittered and rebellious mark as Tybalt before his early demise. The players seem to bring out or find more humor in the play than I had noticed before, but then too much is made of Shake-speare's sexual allusions. Director Loretta Greco says: "The play is a rush of adrenalin, it has such a compressed, heightened sense of time. It's only four days." Hence the emphasis on the clock (to mark "the two hours' traffic of our stage"). Consider Juliet's injunction to Romeo upon his banishment: "I must hear from thee every day in the hour, for in a minute there are many days." And when we reach the hour of reckoning, does the death of the young lovers, victims of a senseless family feud, leave us indifferent or unmoved? I think not. I admit that the opening of this play left me cold. All the characters standing around, looking self-conscious, waiting for something to happen and dressed as if they were at a rehearsal. But this is a modern dress production and so black T-shirts, leather pants, and the like would not be out of line. They soon get into a brawl, and the hands of the clock move on inexorably. Time waits for no man, not even our Romeo. Greco wrote to Libby Appel, OSF's artistic director, that she was growing weary of directing new plays and "would love the challenge of working with one of the masters. Preferably a dead one. I thought a dead playwright might be more appreciative. More collaborative. In a strange way more rigorous." So Appel gave her "Romeo and Juliet," Well, I wouldn't presume to speak for the Bard, but I think he would likely give Greco a "thumbs up." Make that two, if you include mine. LINKS: REVELS: Main | Calendar | Dining | Movies | T.V. DAILY TIDINGS: Main | Sports | Business | Obituaries | Opinion | Columnists | AP News | Subscribe | Archives | Weather | Classifieds | Contact Us | Privacy Copyright 2003 Ashland Daily Tidings 541.482.3456. 1661 Siskiyou Blvd., Ashland, OR 97520. Ottaway Newspapers, Inc. - Advertisers -