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Sections Home Page Local News AP News Archives Business Classifieds Event Calendar Forums Life Opinion Obituaries Photo Gallery Readers Photo Gallery Sports Tempo Weather Special Coverage 2006 Britt Festivals --> Shop Our Valley AutoFinder HomeFinder JobFinder Search Our Valley Special Sections Homelife Magazine Joy Magazine Readers Choice 2006 Oregon Golf Info Oregon Wine Info Our Valley Other Publications Local Links Ashland News eSouthernOregon Newspapers In Education Personals Moving Here Movie Listings TV Listings Volunteer Customer Service Advertise With Us Media Kit Place Classified Ad Contact Us FAQ's Home Delivery Site Map --> Email Story to a Friend June 20, 2006 OSF's 'Two Gentlemen' is Shakespeare lite' Director Bill Rauch's "The Two Gentlemen of Verona" pours the old wine of some familiar Shakespearean worlds into new skins and comes up with a fizzy, new vintage. The play is not vintage Bard, but with the right staging and cast, it leaves a pleasant finish. "Two Gentlemen" is Shakespeare lite, a love-and-betrayal romp with a clinker ending. This time out, Verona, from which most of the main characters come, has become a close-knit, Amish-like, faith-based community. Milan and its court are now a country club world of very green lawns and very dry martinis. These are bold choices. About the only thing guaranteed to put you off a play faster than hearing "it's an Amish thing" would be "it's a country club thing." But in the Oregon Shakespeare Festival's final outdoor season opening Sunday, the concept was carried out with such breezy assurance by Rauch and his creative team (scenic designer Christopher Acebo, costume designer Joyce Kim Lee and lighting designer Robert Peterson) that many will feel a certain resonance in this world where excesses, both religious and capitalist, have their sway. If you think of Shakespeare as wine, you will struggle if you approach "Two Gentlemen" as a serious Bordeaux. Rather, it is light and bubbly little thing designed to produce a mild and pleasurable buzz for a summer's night. Advertisement Verona is another instance of that Shakespearean realm, the world of young love and parental authority. Milan is another Shakespeare milieux, the sophisticated and corrupting world of the court. A third Shakespeare world is also present, the green world of forests, wild things, magic and outlaws. Rauch's outlaws, alienated from both the other camps, have here become snarling, leather-clad, comic-relief punks. Like "The Merry Wives" of Windsor," "Two Gentlemen of Verona" has always been seen as one of Shakespeare's least consequential plays. Valentine (Juan Rivera LeBron) leaves Verona for Milan to serve the Duke (William Langan), his friend Proteus (Gregory Linington) follows, lays eyes on the Duke's daughter, Silvia (Sarah Rutan), and quickly betrays both his love, Julia (Miriam A. Laube), and Valentine. It's a thin story made downright embarrassing by a famously bad ending. Failing to win Silvia's heart, Proteus starts to rape her. Stopped by Valentine, he says hey, he's sorry. Well in that case, Valentine says, go ahead, you can have her. Well thanks, Proteus says, but come to think of it, she doesn't have anything any other woman doesn't have, so I guess I'll settle for Julia after all. The festival has portrayed Valentine's reaction in its guide as an "ultimate gesture of honor" — an appeal to the Renaissance tradition of friendship literature, as if that excuses any of this, or as if the tradition didn't also include the virtue of loyalty. Face it. Proteus a not only a "knave," as we're told in the play, but an irredeemable cad. Valentine is not only a "lubber," as we're told, but a hopeless ninnyhammer. The Duke is a cardboard parent figure. Silvia is arm candy with one redeeming virtue, the ability to see through the repugnant and transparent Proteus. Only Julia's pluck — she's a prototype of great Shakespeare heroines to come — sets her apart, which doesn't take much. The only character to care about in all this is the clown Launce (David Kelly), a natural man of wit and humanity who provides comic relief. Kelly seems to take little notice of the larger plot, as if he wandered in by mistake from a better play and is doing some slumming. Far from being jarring, it's an engaging effect. You can't talk about Launce without talking about his dog, Crab (Terwilliger). The two form almost a single character, Launce/Crab. Terwilliger, a canine-method actor, is too good-looking to play Crab, "the sourest-natured dog that lives," but he plays him with verve. He has great chemistry with Kelly, reacting to the human's lines and even fixing him with a doggy double-take. The play is usually seen as an immature experiment in comedy. An alternative view is that its "failings" are ironic, and Shakespeare was laughing up his sleeve at the fashionistas of the day. Excepting clowns and outlaws, the men in the play, the "gentlemen," are fools, rotters, tyrants, poseurs and fools, early instances in a long line. Rauch has an uncanny way of finding the brio in lesser Shakespeare, and that's a compliment. His "The Comedy of Errors" sparkled two years ago. Shakespeare fundamentalists may not like it, but if you can't riff on the foibles of these people, what's left? Don't look for Hamlet. This is a romp that doesn't ask you to think too hard, a stylish goof, a fickleness-filled riff on human frailty. It is a sweet, razzle-dazzle, mildly intoxicating spritzer for a summer's eve. Reach reporter Bill Varble at 776-4478 or [email protected] . Mail Tribune Home | Local News | Sports | Business | Obituaries | Life | Opinion AP News | Archives | Site Map | Community | Classified Copyright © 1997-2006 Mail Tribune, Inc. 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