Staging a ‘Dream’ with Mendelssohn

The new, bigger and perhaps better Hollywood Bowl shell is roomy enough for theatrical presentations and includes giant video screens. So, on Tuesday night, for its first concert in the structure, the Los Angeles Philharmonic took advantage of the shell’s new features to pay homage to a bit of Bowl history by inviting the excellent Glendale theater company A Noise Within to stage “A Midsummer Night’s Dream,” with Mendelssohn’s incidental music conducted by Esa-Pekka Salonen.

That bit of history was the famous production of Shakespeare’s play by Max Reinhardt, the brilliant German emigre stage director, presented at the Bowl in 1934. It was, by all accounts, sheer magic, with the amphitheater turned into what film producer Hal Wallis described as “an enchanted vale ... a gossamer world untouched by reality.”

Child star Mickey Rooney was a hyperactive Puck, the teenage Olivia de Havilland a gorgeous Titania. The Philharmonic played film composer Erich Wolfgang Korngold’s sentimental version of Mendelssohn’s score.

If the Bowl production captured anything of the fantasy found in the Reinhardt film made the following year, the show really was magical. There were eight performances, and 140,000 people attended.

Tuesday night’s earthy performance was not fanciful, nor did that seem the intent. For all that technology has wrought, some conjuring tricks, such as removing the shell altogether and hauling in tons of dirt to plant an enchanted glen, are simply no longer feasible 70 years later.

In fact, something even less magical or sylvan than was found in this generally agreeable production, presented in what looked like 18th century garb, would have been even more to the point. The Bowl is no longer an enchanted anything but rather a not-so-distant part of the urban landscape, with loud, low-flying police helicopters overhead every so often creating an ominous “Blade Runner” vibe.

The audience multitasked, 21st century style, with a viewer’s attention divided between the stage and video screens on the sides. Contemporary reality impinged on the screens as well when the large video images of the actors showed the microphones they were wearing on their heads.

The amplified sound system, still being tinkered with, is another unavoidable aspect of our time. It was certainly much more acceptable Tuesday than it had been at the Hollywood Bowl Orchestra’s opening concert, but still there is no question that this is flat, artificial sound.

Curiously, A Noise Within managed to cope with the Bowl slightly better than did the Philharmonic. Directors Geoff Elliot and Julia Rodriguez Elliott kept the production intelligently straightforward. The scenic elements, designed by Michael C. Smith, were minimal: a pedestal here and there for the mortals, some pyramid jungle gyms for the fairies. Energetic actors used every bit of space they could find. The fairies were especially cute, what with their brightly colored feathered costumes and beach balls.

A nice touch was Steve Weingartner’s Puck -- actually, with shaved head and goatee, this sprite wasn’t nice at all but slightly threatening, which gave the production just the edge it needed. Deborah Strang also stood out as a sultry Titania. It’s rare to find a Bottom who isn’t funny; even so, Alan Blumenfeld made the humor quite broad, yet still hilarious. All in all, the large cast was assured. A goofy wedding procession seemed just about right for the circumstances.

Mendelssohn’s music, on the other hand, didn’t really come across. The overture needs to set the mood immediately, and it didn’t. Partly, that was because it took a while for the amplification to settle down. But all through the evening, the orchestra sounded relegated to the background. Salonen did find many details to emphasize, but he was also operating in his most efficient mode, seemingly happy to underscore the drama. The women of the Pacific Chorale and the soloists, soprano Heidi Grant Murphy and mezzo-soprano Stephanie Blythe, with little to sing, were placed behind the orchestra and made little impact.

The program opened with the premiere of the orchestral version of a fanfare written for the occasion by James Newton Howard. Music better suited for television, it lasted less than two minutes, but the composer couldn’t be bothered to orchestrate it himself.