BWW Reviews: Kentucky Shakespeare's Magical TEMPEST Hits Personal Notes

I first saw "The Tempest" produced professionally at Atlanta's Shakespeare Tavern in 2001. A high school senior and still largely a fresh-faced wallflower, I experienced a production I recall being intensely suspenseful, and the actor playing Prospero gave the deposed nobleman a dangerous edge. His "I forgive thee" came with a subtextual "Don't make me regret it." It was a thrilling spectacle.

The C. Douglas Ramey Amphitheater is a decidedly different environment than The Tavern's recreated Globe staging, and many thousands of eyes will enjoy this play via the production mounted as the opening of Kentucky Shakespeare's Central Park summer season. Give credit to this company that a 400-year-old stage play is the epitome of local must-see entertainment, where crowds will fill the freshly installed open-air amphitheater benches for each performance.

The production, directed with a confident hand and voluminous imagination by Kentucky Shakespeare head Matt Wallace, is an on-point realization of Shakespeare's purported final play. In this script, The Bard displayed the full breadth and mastery of his craft: the techniques, tropes, styles, and metaphysical thread which binds it all together, and this company by and large executes all with aplomb.

Even more engaging than the dramatic ingredients is the soul of the piece, which Wallace has artfully drawn out to craft a play with a deeply personal reach. The eyes which witnessed this production are very different than they were 14 years ago. Amid the magic and machinations, I spent most of the play in a state of commiseration with a man possessed of plentiful book smarts and a few lines at the corners of his eyes; one who has been dragged through the dirt and still bears the dust; who needs an occasional reminder of the strength found in forgiveness; and who can hardly wait to mess with his daughter's suitors.

Jon Huffman brings power and gravity to Prospero befitting the forceful entrance Wallace gives him, but the human dimensions Huffman gives him are what give the play the maturity of its style. For his rage and bitterness, this Prospero has raised a child as sweet as honey and pure as fallen snow. He acts with decisiveness, but also mirth and mercy. He suffers no fools, but welcomes old friends with open arms. In his grand monologue renouncing his magic, he indulges in the full sweep and scale of his power - and yet allows us to witness him outgrow it. A tour de force performance.

But before that climactic moment of epiphany, Prospero calls to arms the grand scope of his supernatural arts, and Wallace puts the full force of the tools at his disposal to the task. This season marks the introduction of a brand-new lighting and flying truss over the stage, with the world-renowned experts at ZFX Flying Studio raising Ariel and her fellow spirits aloft. Whether engaged in a zero-gravity tug of war with Prospero or terrifying the shipwrecked nobles from overhead, Wallace goes for broke with his new toys.

Sweeping supernatural elements were the grand topper to the panoply of elements Shakespeare incorporated into his script. Coming to the close of his career, the playwright put many of his most useful storytelling elements into the mix. In the clowning realm, Greg Maupin brings his inimitable comedic skills to the role of Stephano, playing well off of Zachary Burrell's Trinculo and relishing his faux-authority over the scaly, demonic Caliban (Dathan Hooper, in a physical showcase). The plotting of scheming nobles is the through-line to Prospero's resolution, but lack a freshness and immediacy to keep pace with the magician's power and the clowns' fooling.

Donna Lawrence-Downs' costumes could set the scene by themselves, but Paul Owen compounds the visual effect with a fortresslike set blended with tropical overgrowth. Laura Ellis' sound design creates the full fury of the storms, complemented by Scott Bradley's enchanting musical contributions.

This eager, well-navigated blending of Shakespeare's own book of spells truly provides something for everyone to enjoy. Though taking a more leisurely pace within its two-hour running time, "The Tempest" succeeds in making Wallace and Shakespeare's case that "the rarer action is in virtue than in vengeance," a consideration well worth presenting to anyone to ponder. A worthy companion to 2014's "Midsummer Night's Dream" and pleasing opener to this season of Shakespeare.

"The Tempest"
Directed by Matt Wallace
Presented by Kentucky Shakespeare
June 12-14, In rotating repertory July 15, 18, 23, and part of this summer's "Bard-A-Thon" with "Macbeth" and "The Taming of the Shrew" July 25.
For more information, go to www.kyshakespeare.com

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