A Haunting CAESAR at the Patapsco Ruins

Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar contains so many famous speeches—most of them filled with weighty words such as Freedom, Justice, Honor—it is easy to forget how much action the play packs into its tight structure. Easy, that is, unless one has recently come from the Patapsco Female Institute Historic Park in Ellicott City, where the Chesapeake Shakespeare Company is staging the great tragedy around that venue’s “Haunted Ruins.” And I do mean around.

You see, in this production—as in last season’s acclaimed Macbeth—the audience moves with the actors. Waiting “outside” the theatre for the play to start, we are surrounded by costumed people cheering Caesar’s latest military triumph, and suddenly, wonderfully, we are part of the mob—a point reinforced by the hurried entrance of two Roman senators, who accost us for our unruliness as we jostle past. Later scenes unfold before a balcony, beneath a tent, in an open field; Marc Antony delivers his funeral oration for Caesar—whose bloody assassination by Brutus, Cassius, and the rest of the conspirators plays out in a coldly lit courtyard—upon a flight of stone steps framed by huge columns.

The cumulative effect—even accounting for the inevitable, awkward transitions that occur when several hundred people squeeze simultaneously through narrow corridors—is to create one of the most intimate, riveting theatrical experiences I have ever had. Director Frank B. Moorman has trimmed the text to a crisp two hours, yet nothing seems to have been lost; the psychological complexities of Caesar, Antony, Cassius, and especially Brutus—Shakespeare’s first tragic hero who turns inward, and a crucial step toward Hamlet—are coherent and vividly brought to life by the first-rate cast.

Scott Alan Small’s Brutus and Michael P. Sullivan’s Cassius cut the most imposing figures, whether clad in soldier’s garb or in top hats and ties. (Costume designer Karen Eske sets the play in an apparently Victorian universe—the actual effect is less incongruous than it sounds, and perhaps it makes the characters a bit more accessible than if they’d simply worn togas.) These are strong, physical men, whose barely restrained power seems always on the verge of breaking through the checks forged by civility and intellect. “Brutus and Caesar,” tempts Cassius, “what should be in that ‘Caesar’? / Why should that name be sounded more than yours?” Watching Small and Sullivan chafe under their perceived bonds, we cannot help but agree.

Few conspirators in history are more notorious than Brutus and Cassius—Dante places them with Judas Iscariot in the bottommost depth of his Inferno—yet Shakespeare’s play is most compelling as it gradually reveals the friendship that cements (and is cemented by) their conspiracy. Small and Sullivan are equally affecting in this light, particularly when set against the more obvious marriage of convenience that exists between Octavius, Caesar’s great-nephew (and the future emperor), and Antony, Caesar’s favorite. Octavius and Antony win the battle that concludes the play, but Brutus and Cassius win our sympathy … and possibly our admiration.

That said, Antony’s is easily the flashier role—when well delivered, his “Friends, Romans, countrymen, lend me your ears …” is one of the most exhilarating speeches ever written. And when the time comes for him to mount those stairs and command our attention, Daniel Corey is sensational. One hopes in a few years the Chesapeake Shakespeare Company stages Antony and Cleopatra, so that Corey has an opportunity to complete the great warrior’s own tragic arc.

Kevin Costa’s smirking Casca stands out amongst the conspirators. Rebecca Ellis is poignant in her lone appearance as Brutus’s wife, Portia; in contrast, Bridget Garwood’s voice is somewhat overwhelmed by the outdoor space, limiting her effectiveness as Caesar’s wife, Calpurnia. The same might be said of James Jager’s Octavius. As for Caesar himself, Frank Mancino seems mostly puffed with hot air—though the effect is funny, Mancino never quite locates the mighty heart that still beats in the aging body.

Moorman and set and lighting designer Dan O’Brien make efficient and occasionally ingenious use of the space—the simple strobe effect that O’Brien creates for Caesar’s ghost is particularly chilling. Fight choreographers James Jager and Eric Lund stage a crisp battle of Philippi, though I can’t explain why properties designer Kristina Lambdin equipped some of the soldiers with swords and others with shovels.

Julius Caesar closes November 1^st. Don’t miss the chance to see it.

Julius Caesar is playing at Patapsco Female Institute Historic Park, located at 3691 Sarah’s Lane in Ellicott City, on Thursdays, Fridays, and Saturdays at 8 PM and Sundays at 6 PM, through November 1^st. Tickets are $25-$30 for adults, $22 for seniors, and $10 for students 21 and under. For more information, visit www.chesapeakeshakespeare.com or call 866-811-4111.  Groups of 10 or more should call 410-313-8874.

Photo Credit: Teresa Castracane Photography

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