Summer Theatre in the Berkshires

With Ann laid up for most of the summer, I took in a theatre fix by heading to Lennox, MA for a long weekend in August. Only a couple of hours from Nashua, the Berkshires is the place to go for an incredible range of wonderful theatre options. Shakespeare & Company is almost like a small college campus with its three theatres, housing for actors, and an outdoor staging area. At any given time over the summer, there are at least six plays in reperatory. Most, but not all are Shakespeare. While I was there I saw two very different, but equally excellent, productions on the main stage (Founder's Theatre)--Twelfth Night and Othello. Twelfth Night was fast-moving, full of physical humor, and really fun to experience. No big stars--just accomplished actors doing what they do best . . .

Othello, starring John Douglas Thompson was a break-out hit last summer in Lennox and was recreated for the New World Theatre in New York last fall. Thompson reprised the role this summer, and I felt so privileged to be able to see him in this role. He is nothing short of amazing--the perfect Othello. Watching as Iago turns this Othello from a strong, eloquent, and comanding soldier and lover to a paranoid man consumed with doubt and jealousy was almost more than I could bear. I had to stop myself from standing up and yelling at him not to listen to that damn Iago!!

I was also lucky enough to see Thompson as part of a three person ensemble in a production of an early John Patrick Shanley (Doubt,

Moonstruck) play entitled A Dreamer Examines His Pillow at the smaller Jacob's Theatre. The play centers on a young couple who have a turbulent on-again, off-again relationship and the woman's father (played by Thompson) who has had his own share of troubles with intimate relationships. This production was 90 minutes of intensity and really showcased the three actors involved. It felt good to get that thrill of turning to the Arts section of the NYT and seeing a big article about Thompson playing the these two roles.

I also saw an unexpectedly good production of Ibsen's Ghosts at the Berkshire Theater Festival. Ghosts is Ibsen's response to all the criticism he received for A Doll's House and Nora's decision to leave her husband and children at the end of the play. In Ghosts, the central character,Helene

chooses to remain in a disastrous marriage on the advice of her priest. This choice condemned her to a life of covering up her husband's many vices and sending away her only son to grow up abroad. The action of the play takes up years later after the death of her husband and upon the return of her son (who, it is implied, has syphilis) and of her morally unbending priest. As you can imagine, all hell breaks loose . . . The play was well acted, the set was quite innovative, and the production was pretty terrific. Interestingly, I saw a production of A Streetcar Named Desire at the Barrington Stage Company that same night, and in the production notes, I read that Tennessee Williams decided to become a playwright after seeing a production of Ghosts as a young man. This was the weakest of the plays I saw while in the Berkshires, but it was still quite good.

Although I missed my CultureBuddy, I had a great, theater-filled weekend in the Berkshires, and I look forward to returning next summer (with Ann!).