Shakespeare in Hollywood
Reviewed by SUSAN DAVIDSON
The Washingtonian

Two and a half Stars

In Shakespeare In Hollywood, premiering through October 19, in the Fichandler at Arena Stage, playwright Ken Ludwig asks the audience to suspend its disbelief not once but twice. First, by believing that movies were made in Hollywood in 1935 the way Hollywood has portrayed how movies were made in Hollywood in 1935, and second, by having his audience believe in Shakespeare’s Dream, a fairy story.

Act I, scene one begins with stage director Max Reinhardt, who in 1935 was a recent immigrant to Hollywood. Having been a successful stage director in his native Austria, Reinhardt wanted to make his mark in America and in the new medium of film with Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream. It was his first and last foray into moviemaking. The juxtaposition of the surrealism in Shakespeare’s Dream and the make-believe of Hollywood circa 1935 leads to conflict and farce, some of which is very funny-I’m still giggling over a sight gag involving Oberon and Lydia Lansing-and to scene-chewing, some of which is annoying. Kyle Donnelly’s heavy-handed direction is particularly noticeable when she has two gifted comediennes, Alice Ripley-as Lydia Lansing, the ambitious ingenue with a serious crotch itch-and Ellen Karas, as Louella Parsons, screech their lines.

Hollywood was filled in the ’30s with larger-than-life personalities like studio mogul Jack Warner and gossip maven Louella Parsons, dressed (and hatted) to kill by costumer Jess Goldstein. Both get to do their schtick, but they seem stupid compared with the characters in Dream, Oberon, King of the Fairies (Casey Biggs), and his sidekick, the troublemaking Puck (Emily Donahoe). Biggs, by the way, is superb. One can only hope that this gig will get him more work locally.

It is playwright Ludwig’s misfortune not only to have his backstage comedy directed by someone whose style has an affinity with Saturday-morning cartoons but also to follow in the path of Michael Frayn’s stage play Noises Off and Tom Stoppard’s doctoring of the movie Shakespeare In Love. They cover some of the same ground, but Shakespeare in Hollywood lacks their tempo and bite. Nevertheless, plenty of theatergoers will enjoy its over-the-top silliness.

September 15, 2003