Playwright: William Shakespeare. At: First Folio Theatre, Mayslake Forest Preserve, Oak Brook. Tickets: 1-630-986-8067; www.firstfolio.org; $26-$37. Runs through: Aug. 19
It’s cooler near the lake by day, but cooler away from the lake at night, which is why I was enjoying The Merchant of Venice outdoors at Oak Brook’s Mayslake Forest Preserve. The breeze and lovely surroundings made for a humid-but-comfortable 80 degrees. But just as Bassanio arrived to woo Portia at Belmont (the fictional Italian city, not the street), the show was suspended due to rapidly approaching violent storms. It’s Act III as Shakespeare wrote it. Had it been the storm on the heath in King Lear, the First Folio folks could have kept going. As it was, I was robbed of the wooing scene, the climactic trial scene and the romantic conclusion to what is, technically, a comedy.
Based on the half-performance I saw, this is a handsome and entertaining production of Shakespeare’s ever-popular play, staged by director Alison C. Vesely without high concept or directorial re-imagining. It’s Shakespeare straight (as in whiskey straight), set in Renaissance Venice as written and acted by a large ensemble (19) with clarity and vigor as required in an outdoors setting, even with amplification (sound design and period-flavored original music by Christopher Kriz). More and more, this is how I like my classics served.
If you’ve ever visited Venice, you’ll be taken immediately by Angela Weber Miller’s Canaletto-inspired stage setting, with its richly evocative background painting of the Rialto bridge, and by Rachel Lambert’s reflective costumes (some saucy and some solemn), complimented by Michael McNamara’s lighting. The gardens and tall grasses of the Mayslake Forest Preserve hint at the orchards behind high walls of Renaissance palazzos, and the grassy spaces of the farther-out islands of the Venetian lagoon. Smartly, Vesely’s ensemble stage business never lets you forget that Venice was a mercantile town.
Under Vesely’s direction, the titular merchant, Anthonio (Michael Joseph Mitchell), is a two-faced piece of work (indeed, Janus is one of the play’s classical allusions) with his hatred of Shylock undisguised in their initial confrontation. Michael Goldberg’s Shylock is less confrontational but equally open in expressing his hatred of Anthonio and all Christians, which is more Shakespeare’s historical anti-Semitism than anything Goldberg and Vesely bring to the plate. Regrettably, I couldn’t see how their antagonisms played out in the trial scene.
The women—Melanie Keller as Portia and Cassidy Shea Stirtz as Jessica—are attractive and capable in their early scenes but have much more to do in the play’s second half. Vesely offers plenty of comic counterpoint in Portia’s Spanish (Lane Flores) and Moroccan (Stephan Collins-Stepney) wooers and through various secondary characters such as Gratiano (Luke Daigle) and Lancelot Gobbo (Nate Santana). By all indications, this Merchant is worth the journey to Oak Brook, where cooler climes are a bonus.