'Jukebox' joyful dance through ShakespeareBy DIANA KENNEY STAFF WRITER NORTH TRURO - In the land of iPod and TiVo, where you can string together your favorite songs or TV shows and skip the rest, where does that old wit Shakespeare fit in? Wellfleet‘s Knighthorse Theatre Company has figured out how to offer brilliant bits of the Bard on demand: “Shakespearean Jukebox," playing at the Payomet Performing Arts Center tent. This interactive show is instantly appealing to people of all ages and levels of familiarity with Shakespeare. The audience members are given a list of Shakespeare‘s 38 plays and asked to spring their requests on Knighthorse, which is the husband-and-wife team of Tyrus Lemerande and Amy McLaughlin Lemerande. The night I saw it, we were treated to boffo scenes from “A Midsummer Night‘s Dream," “The Tempest," “Macbeth," “Julius Caesar," “Henry IV, Part I," “The Taming of the Shrew" and “King Lear." This may sound gimmicky, but it‘s a fantastic way to hook people into Shakespeare, especially children. We all know Shakespeare can go on and on. For every hell‘s-a-poppin‘ action scene there is usually a long, talky passage that by the end has everybody (except the English majors) dazed and confused. “Shakespearean Jukebox" gets at the best parts without making the audience work too hard, without turning them off before they have a chance to get clued in. The Lemerandes bend over backward to involve the audience. Besides letting us select the program, they invite all children to sit onstage, where they are cast as fairies or pages to often comical results. Forget about dozing off, because the house lights are kept on at all times and the Lemerandes directly address individual audience members. And the feistier audience members, when talked to, talk back. That invites the surreal experience of finding out what they are thinking as they show unfolds, instead of sitting in the dark in your own private cocoon. When Amy delivered Kate‘s famous soliloquy from “The Taming of the Shrew," she asked a woman in the audience, “And when (a wife) is forward, peevish, sullen, sour/And not obedient to (her husband‘s) honest will/What is she?" the audience member unexpectedly shot back, “Perfect." The Lemerandes guide us merrily and skillfully into Shakespeare. When a scene is requested, they give a “nutshell" version of the play‘s plot in modern English before acting it out. It also helps that they are extremely physical actors, comfortable and daring with each other. They pick each other up, knock each other down, kiss, punch, seduce, wrestle and mess with each other to an eye-popping degree, which went over hugely well. In their declamations, the Lemerandes tend to accelerate fast to full tilt and stay there, which certainly grabs the audience‘s attention but also begs for some range, some quieter moments. As Kate the Shrew, Amy does settle into a more centered delivery, where she seems to be working from the inside out rather than the outside in. Tyrus Lemerande has a gigantic stage presence, and he knows his stuff. Back-to-back, he can do a monstrous Caliban from “The Tempest," a sneaky Hotspur from “Henry the IV," a drunken Petruchio from “The Taming of the Shrew" and a truly moving, tragic King Lear, cast out into a storm by his pitiless daughters. Lemerande is winningly energetic, and he uses his hands like a language, creating gestures that resonate with the text. But he also can be a bit of a stage hog, off on a roll and in love with his voice. Amy, who is more tuned in to the audience, had to elbow her way in several times to speak up and offer clarifications, which seemed to throw Tyrus off. He could share the spotlight more deftly. Have the Lemerandes actually memorized all of Shakespeare, so they could do any scene requested? No, not yet. One audience member brought up the “chink in the wall" scene from “A Midsummer Night‘s Dream" (which is one of my favorites, too), but the Lemerandes sidestepped it and instead did the love-starved Hermia pursuing poor Demetrius in the wood (also great, rambunctious fun). But give the Lemerandes time - they might get all of Shakespeare under their belts, even the boring parts! Diana Kenney can be reached at dkenney@capecodonline.com.
What: Shakespeare by the Shore; Shakespearean Jukebox, by the Knighthorse Theatre Company |