Shakespeare Meets ‘300’
By Joe Meyers
Photo caption Troilus (Hugo Salazar, right) faces off with rival Diomedes (Tim Williams) in Troilus and Cressida at the Stratford Library on Saturday.
Hudson Shakespeare Company artistic director Jon Ciccarelli is only half-joking when he describes his new production of Troilus and Cressida as a “sword and sandals” epic.
Actually a Hollywood angle on the rarely performed play is not as far out as you might think, because some scholars have speculated that the Bard himself went through periods when he tried to court the same “youth market” that rules today’s movie industry.
“There’s a theory that Shakespeare wrote the play (primarily) for private performances in the law schools in London,” Ciccarelli said during a phone interview last week.
Ciccarelli’s touring production arrives at the Stratford Library Saturday afternoon for a free outdoor presentation in the amphitheater.
Troilus and Cressida tells the story of Trojan lovers that isn’t found in The Illiad or The Odyssey. Shakespeare drew from a medieval love story to give younger people in ancient Greek story that they could relate to.
Shakespeare in turn used the tragic tale of young lovers to answer a question his own audiences asked frequently, What would have happened if Romeo and Juliet had lived? Would the relationship had worked?
“Shakespeare answered that question and its ‘No’,” Ciccarelli said with a chuckle.
Shakespeare views romantic love with a satirical eye in both plays.
“Everyone is acting in heroic ways but in too many cases they act like morons so their own (tragic) end is pre-destined,” the director said.
Despite all of the swooning and weeping that can surround a Shakespeare romantic tragedy, you can often see what the writer really thought about love through his slightly jaded secondary characters.
“Mercutio in Romeo and Juliet sees what a shmuck Romeo is. Romeo is put out there as this romantic ideal, but you can see him as brainless twit too,” Ciccarelli observed.
“Who knows what might have happened after the bloom was off the rose?” the director added of what might have been if Romeo and Juliet had lived.
In Troilus and Cressida, young love is interrupted not by family feud, but by war and this is where the action movie elements come in.
“There’s more scripted fighting than in Julius Caesar, the director said of the sword fights that punctuate the action.
“I think this is perfect for the summer because of the spectacle and the full traditional (Greek) look of our version”, he added.
The Jersey City based troupe has been touring the tri-state areas for almost 20 years. Ciccarelli said that audience and performance interest in summer outdoor Shakespeare never seems to wane.
“From an actor’s standpoint, it’s a way to test your mettle,” he said of each new performing generation’s desire to put its own mark on plays that have been continually performed for more than 400 years.
“I think for contemporary audiences the (outdoor) trend really started with Joe Papp in Central Park,” the director said of New York Shakespeare Festival, which was launched in the 1950s and has flourished ever since.
“It’s a perfect staple item for summer because the plays were crated to be adaptable to different places and circumstances,’ Ciccarelli said at the way the shows were done both indoors and outside in Shakespeare’s time-and always with a mainstream audience in mind.
“These are stories that have just kept fascinating audiences,” the director said.
