It’s been 15 years since the Colorado Shakespeare Festival has produced “All’s Well That Ends Well,” and based on the current effort, it should have waited another 15 years in the hope that this interval would circumvent such a misguided adaptation.
In her notes to the play, director Lynne Collins informs us that this comedy has long been considered a problem play, which she says is attributable to the transgression of traditional gender roles. To remedy this problem, she sets the play in 1660, when women first legally appeared on the English stage, causing a great deal of friction between male and female actors.
The issue, however, is unsustainable in this adapted form and has been explored already to superb effect in the big-screen costumer, “Stage Beauty,” starring Billy Crudup and Claire Danes.
As a result, we are made to suffer through a confusing extemporaneous prologue in which Collins sets up the conceit of a play within a play, with the male actors preparing to play all the roles. Andrea Bechert’s mock period stage is a lovely, detailed rendition, but its setting at the back of the real stage produces an endless series of half-audible dialogues.
Coupled with passages acted in the stiff, presentational style of the period, the staging saps the through-line of its energy and mocks the emotional underpinnings of the story, thus creating real problems where there were none. After this initial attempt at cleverness, the metaphor is mostly abandoned until the end of the play when, again, the climax is undermined by a reminder that this was all a theatrical put-on.
There are, though, a number of performances that deserve attention.
Randy Moore as Lafew, an elder lord, is full of mirth sprinkled with a mix of wisdom and self-possession. He provides a breath of fresh air with his natural scansion and clear projection.
The emotional ballast of the play is first revealed when Cheryl McFarren as the Countess and mother to Bertram, counsels Helena. McFarren’s heartfelt, communicative style and judicious exercise of personal power remind us of the moral forces at work.
Sam Sandoe impresses in contrasting roles: finding the rhythm of the fool, Layatch, as well as the genial but formidable currents of the wry and watchful Old Widow of Florence.
Elgin Kelley deftly provides Diana, the Widow’s daughter and an object of Bertram’s advances, with an impressive arc that circumscribes an initially naïve and flirtatious young woman and her transformation to a sublime and astute courtier.
Clare Henkel’s elegant period costumes are another bright note in an otherwise tonally-challenged composition. Given the distortions created by the interpretation of the play, it’s hard to tell whether the excesses of Helena and Bertram were actor- or director- driven, so the performances of Julila Motyka and Charles Gamble are outside the scope of this analysis.
Let’s be frank: In Shakespeare, there are no problem plays, only problematic interpretations.
The root of the issue is the refusal by entrenched academic and ancillary industries to acknowledge that many think Edward de Vere, the 17th Earl of Oxford, was the actual author of the plays, sonnets, etc. attributed to William Shakespeare.
Once de Vere’s life is illuminated, we see that this play is filled with biographical details, beginning with Bertram’s petulant refusal to consummate his forced marriage to Helena, continuing with “stepsister” Helena’s budding confusion over her relationship with Bertram, moving forward with Bertram’s profligate behavior throughout, climaxing in the famous “bed trick,” and culminating with the resurrection of Helena.
Next time around, we suggest an adaptation in which Bertram is modeled on de Vere and Helena as Anne Cecil. Problem solved: The story is a clever metaphor for actual events with which the entire Elizabethan court was familiar and knowledge of which we owe ourselves and our posterity the pleasure.
Bob Bows also reviews theater for Variety, for KUVO/89.3 FM, and for his own website, . He can be reached at bbows@coloradodrama.com.
All’s Well That Ends Well
COMEDY | Colorado Shakespeare Festival, University Theatre, Mainstage, University of Colorado-Boulder | Written by William Shakespeare |Directed by Lynne Collins| Starring Geoffrey Kent, Charles Gamble, Randy Moore, Sean Tarrant, Sam Sandoe, Cheryl McFarren, Julia Motyka, Elgin Kelley | THROUGH AUG. 17 | 2 p.m., Aug. 5 and 12; 7:30 p.m., Saturday and Aug. 17 | $14-$54 | 303-492-0554 or .
