REVIEW
Shakespeare’s R&J
Kill Your Television
Runs until Jan. 28
Theatre Network – The Roxy on Gateway
8529 Gateway Blvd.
Tickets: $15 to $30. Available at door or at http://www.theatrenetwork.ca
Romeo and Juliet has been produced for centuries as a tragic, romantic tale of two teenagers who kill themselves because a festering family feud prohibits them from being together.
Borrowing Shakespeare's text, American playwright Joe Calarco spins the tale of star-crossed lovers into a quartet of repressed males discovering their emotions and sexuality.
Shakespeare's R&J, now at Theatre Network until Sunday, Jan. 28, revisits the doomed lovers in a bold and exciting way. It offers passionate acting, simple but compelling design elements, a mirror to contemporary life and a lot of eerie darkness.
By day, four male teenagers enrolled in a Catholic prep school are subject to a repetitive round of boring lessons interrupted only by a loud, grating bell. By night however, they discover a tattered book that arrests their imagination and frees them from daily restraints.
Romeo and Juliet becomes the spark that allows these hot-blooded, hormone blanketed adolescents free rein to explore the world on their terms.
Each takes a turn at reading the script and the performance starts as a boy's locker room joke. They snigger and hip-thrust at the dirty bits while jumping into the sword-fighting with unrestrained, rambunctious glee.
But after their initial shyness melts away, they are drawn into the dreamy world of love and romance as well as the nightmarish consequences of violence and death.
In this play-within-a-play, director Kevin Sutley provides a sharp focus that is superbly mapped out. This is an ambitious work and he manages to avoid some pitfalls that occasionally haunt these narratives.
Shakespeare's R&J is captivating to watch in part because the production elements are so simple. Production designer April Viczko creates a haunting ambience with four portable black boxes and five bolts of red cloth to symbolize daggers, blood, vials and costume accessories. Each scene is highlighted by shards of light slicing through the darkness.
We never learn the students' names, yet this four-man cast is so powerful, they create three-dimensional characters and complicated relationships at the flip of a switch. The actors display great range using passion, fervour and a deep understanding of Shakespeare's text.
Oscar Derkx, the handsome leading man, is earnest, passionate and commanding as Romeo and as Student 1. He embodies the sexually charged angst that befits a son of wealth growing up in the class-conscious Verona and the halls of an elite academy.
Luc Tellier, with a cool androgynous look deftly switches from male to female, playing Benvolio, Juliet, and Student 2. He works with extensive material and mines the complexities of each character with charm to develop a fully realized individual.
Braydon Dowler-Coltman has a tall order of four roles and is absolutely riveting. He presents a tour-de-force performance swinging from an angry Student 3 and a bombastic Mercutio, to the dainty Lady Capulet and pained Friar Lawrence caught between two warring families.
And Corben Kushneryk as Nurse, Tybalt, Balthasar/Student 4 is hilarious, heartwarming and a pleasure to watch as his characters bloom before your eyes.
Calarco first produced Shakespeare's R&J in 1997 at a time when the debate of gay marriage had a different weight and carried a different tone. Two decades later the political climate has changed.
The concept of whether this is a gay play or one of four adolescents discovering Shakespeare's work is left up to the theatregoer. Either way, the play has something to say that needs to be heard.
