The Tempest: Presented by Boston Theatre Works at the Cyclorama Theatre (2005)

The Tempest Presented by Boston Theatre Works at the Cyclorama Theatre, Boston Center for the Arts, Boston, Massachusetts. January 13-February 13, 2005. Directed by Jason Slavick. Set and Lighting by Caleb Wertenbaker. Costumes by Gail Astrid Buckley. Sound by K. Bud Durand. Music composed by Warren Levenson. With Jonathan Epstein (Prospero), Elizabeth Hayes (Miranda), Ben Lambert (Ferdinand), Sarah Hickler (Caliban), Susannah Millonzi (Ariel), Neil A. Casey (Trinculo), Allyn Burrows (Stephano), Bill Molnar (Alonso), Douglass Bowen-Flynn (Antonio), Richard la France (Sebastian), Gerald Slattery (Gonzalo), and others. Electronic music with a Renaissance flavor played as the audience streamed into the auditorium for Boston Theatre Works' production of The Tempest. The space of the Cyclorama Theatre in the Boston Center for the Arts complex was cavernous and produced reverberating echoes of the smallest sounds. The set consisted of a square of white fabric (or possibly plastic) taped to the flat stage floor, and to this square the action was confined. The storm scene introduced the audience to a group of lords who were costumed in uniforms, replete with official blue sashes which apparently indicated rank but which made them appear more like Latin American tin-pot dictators than Italian noblemen. With a clap of thunder, Prospero entered and remained upstage, orchestrating the wrack. Prospero's relationship with Miranda appeared to be a troubled one. As Miranda expressed her consternation with the souls she thought drowned, her father shouted at her Tell your piteous heart / There's no harm done. What seemed to be an innate fear of her father surfaced later in the same scene when Prospero informed her, somewhat harshly, Thy father was the Duke of Milan and / A prince of power. Miranda's response was to scoot away from him in horror asking, Sir, are you not my father? This could have been a moment of innocent humor, but its overall effect was more sinister than amusing. Prospero's relationship with Ariel was no less troubled. Dressed in a silver body suit, with matching eye shadow applied like a seventies rock star's, she danced her way into Prospero's arms upon her initial entrance. She demanded her liberty only to enrage Prospero, who shouted at her in anger: Dost thou forget / From what a torment I did free thee?, to which Ariel sulkily replied, No. This pent-up anger amongst the inhabitants of the island was not always effectively deployed, however. For instance, Miranda, trying her bit of power politics out on the unfortunate Caliban bent down to yell at the deformed island native--the Abhorred slave speech. With both the characters crouched in similar positions on the same level, the stage image did not match the power of the vocal level; their similar stances made them seem almost equal in status. A similar lack of differentiation in status also made for confused stage images amongst the Neapolitan lords. There was a blandness in their characterizations--not helped by the nearly identical costumes--which made it difficult to distinguish them individually. Much more difficult still was the lack of danger exuding from Sebastian and Antonio as they plotted the murder of the King of Naples. …