If ever there were a play ripe for the HIDiots to enact, it's The Merry Wives of Windsor. 

Long considered one of Shakespeare's lesser plays, a veritable fan-fiction of his own wildly popular character Falstaff, Merry Wives is said to have been commissioned by Queen Elizabeth herself who supposedly gave the Bard only two weeks to write a play about "Sir John in love."  The resulting plot involves multiple rivals for a young woman's hand, a jealous husband, and Sir John Falstaff attempting to woo the titular wives who foil him at every turn.  The play is almost entirely in prose, full of Elizabethan vernacular which falls mostly flat with modern audiences.  The trick, then, is to manage cut the script to its "best" bits, and augment the comedy through farcical direction.

So how does Hamlet Isn't Dead's latest fare hold up?  Framed as a Christmas trifle, with red-and-green clothes and even ugly sweaters, HID'S Merry Wives is as giddy as a cup of good strong nog.  Once again, the company brings out a strong ensemble full of excellent clowns who double as musicians, and don't object to interjecting modernisms to keep the jingle ball rolling.  Stand-outs include Briana Sakamoto as Robin, Falstaff's servant as channelling by Harpo Marx, and Noah Ruff as the trumpet playing, turtleneck wearing, extremely French Dr. Caius. 

Falstaff himself, played by James Armstrong, is solid although strangely dwarfed among equally large personalities.  Company member Travis Klemm delights in double-duty as Slender, with most of the excised Welsh pastor's lines.  While Associate Producer Sophia Carlin gives a lively Quickly, taking on the excised Bardolf, Pistol and Nym's roles with élan.

The cut is smart, keeping the (very few) known speeches, conflating unnecessary characters, and moving the plot along briskly.  The direction from Artistic Director and Co-Founder David Andrew Laws is sharp, although at times not entirely focused, but with the joy of a good feast: if you didn't like that appetizer, may I interest you in this entrée?  And everything culminates with one of the best uses of a Rudolph costume and mid-90's ska music that you could ever hope to see in a play that is, at its heart, about midwinter madness and holiday hilarity.  Recommended.

The Merry Wives of Windsor plays at the Westbeth Artists' Community at 55 Bethune Street, NYC through Saturday, December 16, 2017.

Tickets are $25 online/$30 at the door.  Purchase tickets through Brown Paper Tickets.

Dr. Caius (Noah Ruff) threatens his romantic rival Slender (Travis Klemm) in HID's Merry Wives of Windsor.

The Merry WIDOWS of Windsor: Rewriting Shakespeare in the Light of #metoo Read the companion piece to this review!

Hamlet Isn't Dead (HID) is a young theatre company in NYC dedicated to presenting Shakespeare's canon in chronological order.  Which means that with this latest offering of a riotous and nuanced Henry V, they've completed both Henriad tetralogies and all of the histories - barring only the contested Henry VIII, which they promise they (sigh) will eventually get to.

HID's brand is nothing if not enthusiastic, incorporating intimate theatre stripped back to the text and buoyant interactions with the audience, much like Shakespeare's groundlings might have experienced.  With Henry V, the company presents its first all-female cast under the direction of Dr. Valerie Clayman Pye, and the result is electric.

Shakespeare's histories can sometimes become difficult to follow, with characters addressed by their titles, and those titles constantly shifting.  Henry V, one of Shakespeare's most accessible history plays, streamlines the story of the warlike Harry down to his invasion of France - here helped with smart and stylish costume design of red and blue, with fitted jackets and repurposed jewelry to give the illusion of military regalia.

James Rightmyer, Jr., Assistant Director to the production and Executive Director of HID, offers one of the most intelligent cuts of the script I have ever seen, combining extraneous characters and moving scenes around to introduce the French court early, and increase the tension of Harry's impossible gambit.  The show is underscored with drums played live primarily by Erica Huang as Gower, sometimes played from behind the audience to keep us all on the bloody fields of France.

The cast works truly as an ensemble, so that it seems almost disingenuous to single any one actor out for her contribution to the whole.  Amelia Cain plays the Chorus solo, inviting the audience's imagination to take wing.  Paige Espinosa shines as the French Dauphin, hitting the right mix of cockiness and absurdity.  The French court, comprised of stately Charlotte Harvey's King, Caroline Osborn's innocent Katherine, and the always-hilarious Samantha Maurice's Queen, prove good foils for their English counterparts.  Notice should also be given to Olivia Cygan's Montjoy, the French herald, who brings simplicity, fear, admiration and steadfastness to what otherwise might have been yet another messenger role.

The English nobles, including Kellly Karcher's wide-eyed Westmoreland, and Claire Alexander's powerful Exeter own the stage beside their noble king.  While April Glick, Erica Huang and Abigaile Slocum mug and tumble admirably as their clowns and private soldiers, led by  Valerie Terranova's winklingly delightful turn as Fluellen - here transformed from a Welsh to a Spanish capitán to the delight of all. 

However, no matter the strength of the ensemble, uneasy lies the play without a lead, and many an otherwise wonderful Henry V has fallen flat because the war-like Harry was only serviceable at best.  There is, in fact, a danger to how Shakespeare wrote this incarnation of one of Britain's greatest kings.  Henry is given enormous speech after enormous speech - all of them good, but which can ultimately tax the listener, or invite the actor to play "noble," or "angry," rather than delving for every nuance.  We forget that Shakespeare was writing for his leading man, Richard Burbage: the same man who could milk comedy next to tragedy as either Hamlet or Macbeth.  What is needed for a Henry V to succeed is an actor of similar dexterity.

Fortunately, HID's Henry V is anchored by none other than long-time company member, Megan Greener.  With sharp features and a deadpan wit, Greener shines best when given wry lines: whether cutting to pieces the insulting gift of tennis balls that begins the play, or attempting to woo the French princess by the journey's end.  Her heroic moments thrill as well, such as entering fearlessly to the sound of drums for "Once more unto the breach."  Old canards sound new in her mouth, so that the St. Crispin Day's speech - a speech that I have heard so often as to cringe at its first lines - is given new breath, new desperation, new hope and vitality in Greener's honest telling.  While her speech considering the heaviness of her office is given all the painful weight of a Hamlet considering his position. 

The all-female casting can often be a gimmick: a desperate ploy to appeal to modern sensibilities; a conceit forced on a production with no real illumination.  Not so here.  When the result of such fierce and intelligent casting is that we get to see the best of each of these fine actors, there is only admiration and joy.

Hamlet Isn't Dead's Henry V is one of the best productions of this play it has been my pleasure to attend.  Highly recommended.

Henry V plays at the Westbeth Artists' Community at 55 Bethune Street, NYC through Saturday, August 5, 2017.

Tickets are $25 online/$30 at the door.  Purchase tickets through Brown Paper Tickets.

Megan Greener gives a funny and formidable performance as the titular King Henry V.  (Photo courtesy of Hamlet Isn't Dead.)

Kelly Karcher and Paige Espinosa battle to the death in Hamlet Isn't Dead's Henry V.  (Photo courtesy of Hamlet Isn't Dead.)

Caroline Osborn, who also plays Katharine the Princess of France, caught in a thoughtful moment.  (Photo courtesy of Hamlet Isn't Dead.)

How Do You Solve a Problem Like Prince Hal? Read the companion piece to this review on Patreon! 

"The beauty of Shakespeare's best roles is their complexity. The joy of the history plays is that they are all of a piece, and we can track the trajectory of a boy playing at prince to a man becoming king. But to lose any part of the paradox of a person is to lose the performance."

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While Shakespearean plays can call for a cast of thousands, there’s a particular charm to seeing these large epics approached by tightly casted companies, such as The Humanist Project’s five-person production of Macbeth.  Using techniques familiar to anyone who’s enjoyed Bedlam’s recent fare, this ensemble manages to transform from hero to villain to halpless lord to short order chef with just a whirl of costume and a change of accent or stance. 
 
This sense of magic is particularly appropriate for Shakespeare’s Macbeth, which is rife with witches, apparitions, and daggers of the mind.  However, the danger of this form is that the tricks—which are numerous and largely satisfying—can come at the expense of real emotional connection to the heart of the story.  The Humanist Project’s ensemble strives to find that balance, and comes—with only a few misfires—fairly close to managing both sides of the scale.
 
Claire Warden as Lady Macbeth is the real stand-out.  Differentiating her several other characters with ease and an impressive physical prowess, she tackles “Unsex me now” with the full weight of terror for what she’s contemplating, while her relationship with her husband varies beautifully from supportive to furious to smug, making her last dénouement into the full realization of what she’s wrought that much more poignant. 
 
As the titular Macbeth, Michael F. Toomey seems less at ease with his role than expected: although perhaps that’s the point.  This Macbeth is not the raging warrior or any man full of vaulting ambition: he’s a pawn, a nervous chess piece unsure of the majority of his actions.  While this leads to some wonderful direction from Andrew Borthwick-Leslie early on to highlight the relative incompetence of these two murderers, it doesn’t sit quite as well as the play progresses and blood has its blood.  Toomey’s verse work, too, seemed to lack the dynamism that previous Macbeths have discovered; a shame for one of Shakespeare’s more verbose leads.
 
Filling up the ensemble, Welland H. Scripps delighted with large physical changes from his powerful First Witch, to his overly-humble Duncan, gumshoe-invested Macduff, and nervously manacled Seyton.  He even sports a Russian-flavored murderer, obviously meant to juxtapose to Toomey’s red tie wearing Macbeth. 
 
Josephine Wilson is a dynamo as Banquo, bringing a much needed morality whether advising or haunting Macbeth.  Her obsequious Lennox and sensual Hecate are well delineated (although Hecate’s singing of “Moondance” mid-play, while seductively rendered, was a conceptual misstep for me).  Her power and command of language and emotion made it difficult to watch her Lady Macduff: less for the horror of that scene than the frustration that this actor wasn’t given even juicier roles to inhabit. 
 
Zach Libresco was charged with both sons of Duncan, a conceit that worked half the time but may have been better executed with a tighter cut of the script.  His star turn came with the Porter, a show-off piece in any production, which allowed Libresco to let his comic buffoonery run wild.  One wishes that his clown work might have extended to his witch, but it was readily picked up in his Macduff son who brought real light to the gentle interplay before the horrific murders.
 
Credit must go to the design team, particularly scenic designer Emmie Finckel, assisted by Elizabeth Olear, whose abstract chalkboard world defied the usual tendency towards blood, blood, and more blood, and paved the way for hands covered in calcifying chalk.  This was echoed in Claire Townsend’s costumes: deconstructed suits and modified black kilts, ornamented with red stitching or frayed with white handprints.  Megan Lang’s lighting created dramatic tableaus of light and dark with instruments hung at unusual angles to achieve a sense of disconnect.  Trampas Thompson’s fight choreography is solid, with a penchant for neck-slitting that’s truly and happily cringe-worthy.  And praise must go to Shiela Bandyopadhyay for her movement choreography, most notable in the witch’s intricate hand choreography to create some Medusa-inspired imagery.
 
But for all of that, how does the play play?  While director Andrew Borthwick-Leslie makes the obvious nod to our current political climate, and provides a fairly clean interpretation of Shakespeare’s classic, there is the sense that Borthwick-Leslie is capable of more.  His hope was to present Macbeth in the abstract: a vision which succeeded.  But in so doing, each small symbol becomes enormous.  So in this chalkboard world, the audience found itself wanting a greater and more focused proliferation of outlined bodies on the floor, or “bloody” handprints on the wall.  The use of chalk for Macduff’s infant child (too good to spoil here) was an excellent effect, but the sense of collaborative play that clearly and happily pervaded the rehearsal room would have been supported more by a definitive plan for the use of symbol throughout.  That said, there are some scenes of absolute genius: keep an eye out for the short order chef scene in act one, and the closet scene in act two.
 
As a portrait of ambition and regret, The Humanist Project’s Macbeth is a good night out at the theatre.  The company’s inventiveness will intrigue those who have enjoyed Eric Tucker’s work, and Shakespeare fans will be satisfied by a new examination of a timely subject.  Recommended.

Macbeth performs at The Secret Theatre in Long Island City, through to Sunday, April 30, 2017. 

Tickets are $18 and can be purchased through The Humanist Project’s website or through Brown Paper Tickets.