Tragic Inconsistencies in ‘Romeo and Juliet’

Directing Shakespeare is a matter of choices taken, choices rejected. For one director, “Hamlet” can be a vehicle to explore Oedipal conflicts a la Freud; for another, Hamlet’s father’s ghost may exist only as a force possessing Hamlet like a demon. For director Des McAnuff one year at the La Jolla Playhouse, “Romeo and Juliet” wasn’t so much a love story as a dream about a love story, dreamed by young people trapped in a fascist state.

For director Kevin Cochran at Grove Theater Center’s Festival Amphitheatre, “Romeo and Juliet” is a bleak tragedy involving smart young people, one of whom (Juliet) is raised by a single parent--though why isn’t clear.

What is clear, however, is that among all the choices Cochran makes as director, some work very well and some are thuddingly bad. The on-again, off-again nature of this version is so curious, in fact, that you’re likely to wonder if the same person made all the choices.

The look, for example, is an ill-fitting blend of the sunny and the sepulchral. The cast is dressed in classic Renaissance garb (care of costumer Don Nelson), but they walk on a set (by Mark Klopfenstein) that suggests less Verona than Stonehenge.

Two off-kilter chunks of what looks like slate rock (one with a nifty hidden tomb entry, the other with a prehistoric archway) dominate the stage, and they feel more like impediments to the actors than a help.

*

They also convey an overwhelming heaviness, which “Romeo and Juliet” only really is in the late going. Until then, the play is reluctant to be a tragedy, wanting to stay as much a comedy-romance for as long as it can possibly be. The play’s genius is how it maintains a form in absolute sync with its lover-heroes.

Here, the light-into-dark transition is ground down by one look at the stage, forcing the actors to work harder than necessary to both lighten the play’s spirit and climb over the damned rocks.

Another choice makes the rocks downright hazardous. Very late in the play, as Juliet (Susan Patterson) is entombed after taking a sleeping potion, her family-approved lover, Paris (A.K. Subramanian), enters the tomb to discover Romeo (Todd Cerveris). Sprinklers above the stage come on, and it begins raining, dousing the raked stone set in water. The effect is ruined precisely because it sounds like sprinklers coming on, but one wonders how it’s raining inside a tomb to begin with. Finally, you worry about the actors slipping on the set.

Other bad choices are less physically risky but still odd. A slightly raised upstairs curtain serves no purpose, and no aesthetic effect. Making us imagine a rough stone staircase as Juliet’s bedroom and balcony is asking the impossible. An opening sword fight (choreographed by Caleb Terray and Aaron MacPherson) among the Montague and Capulet thugs is so clumsily amateurish that it takes the show many minutes to recover.

The good choices, though, make you wonder how the bad ones slipped in. The play’s opening and closing lines are projected on the upstage curtain rather than spoken, lending a fairy-tale quality to the story.

The play’s eventual gloominess seems to interest Cochran much more than its light, and the dark elements are strongly, evocatively drawn. An offstage gong for Juliet’s “funeral” is a simple, powerful touch.

The best choice of all, however, is the casting of Juliet. Patterson matches intelligence with the passion of young womanhood (she’s too strong here to be called a girl).

She rejects the typical Juliet filled with impetuosity for a Juliet who thoughtfully speaks her heart, examining the stars and people’s minds with equal skill. Patterson’s Juliet is definitely someone to die for.

Cerveris has more problems. Squat and compact like a catcher or a halfback, he seems an odd physical choice for Romeo. Cerveris delivers very good American Shakespeare, but he eventually loses control of Romeo’s emotional keel, drifting into a hysteria that’s unintentionally comic.

The intentional comedy, care of Gwenda Deacon’s Nurse, becomes unintentionally goofy and irritating. This is a Nurse with a foghorn voice and a Borscht Belt style that’s more an extended riff than a performance. Daniel Kaemon’s fine Mercutio, by contrast, is comic and so much more: Musical, charismatic, punkish and ultimately sad.

Because the character--but not the lines--of Lord Capulet has been mysteriously cut from this version, Tamiko Washington has the odd assignment of playing Lady Capulet, while also speaking the Lord’s dialogue. She does it with conviction, but a fatherless Juliet requires more explanation than we get here. David Allen Jones, though, is a perfect father figure to Romeo as a tenderhearted, firm but eloquent Friar Lawrence.

* “Romeo and Juliet,” Festival Amphitheatre, Grove Theater Center, 12852 Main St., Garden Grove. Thursdays-Sundays, 8:30 p.m. Ends Aug. 25. $16.50-$24.50. (714) 741-9550. Running time: 2 hours, 40 minutes.

(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX / INFOGRAPHIC)

“Romeo and Juliet,”

Susan Patterson: Juliet

Todd Cerveris: Romeo

Gwenda Deacon: Nurse

Daniel Kaemon: Mercutio

David Allen Jones: Friar Lawrence

Tamiko Washington: Lady Capulet

Derek Medina: Tybalt

A.K. Subramanian: Paris

Steven Opyrchal: Benvolio

A Grove Theater Center production of William Shakespeare’s tragedy. Directed by Kevin Cochran. Set: Mark Klopfenstein. Lights: David Darwin. Costumes: Don Nelson. Fight choreography: Caleb Terray and Aaron MacPherson.