A MIDWINTER NIGHT'S TONIC

It’s a long time since I wrote about Shakespeare. I’m doing so because consistent with my resolution to widen my horizons I went to a performance of “A Midsummer Night’s Dream” on Thursday. It was at our Grandsons’ school and our 13-year-old played Demetrius.

               The ability of the performers to remember so much verse that must have seemed as alien as Latin was remarkable; Shakespeare is hard unless you are schooled in iambic pentameters. 

                

Secondly the spirit and joie de vivre of this cast of young actors was infectious. Amateur productions generally make me feel a little uneasy but as time passed my disbelief and skepticism were entirely suspended. This is exactly what theatre should do.

The play is rather silly. In Theseus’ Athens, where it’s set, daughters who ignore their father’s wishes as to whom they marry, must be executed. That is the law. One felt a certain parental ripple of approval for this through the audience. So, Hermia who’s instructed to marry Demetrius but who wants to marry Lysander instead is immediately in trouble. Helena, Hermia’s friend, is in love with Demetrius but he cannot stand her. Wake up at the back…pay attention. 

Meanwhile (‘meanwhile’ means there’s going to be more complexity) Oberon and Titania – Fairy King and Queen have a tiff and Oberon decides with his acolyte, the naughty nymph Puck, to teach her a lesson and, at the same time, sort out the love quadrangle of Lysander, Demetrius, Hermia, and Helena. (With me so far?) 

The enchanted wood which Oberon and the rest inhabit is, of course, where the star-crossed lovers get lost, Demetrius pursuing Hermia who’s with Lysander and himself being pursued by Helena. (Now is that clear?) Meanwhile a team of “rude mechanicals” – that’s a posh way of describing down-market workmen like Bottom the Weaver – are planning to play a version of “Pyramus and Thisbe” in Theseus’s court.

Back to that magical wood where the dopey quartet of lovers continue to get hopelessly lost and keep lying down to have a snooze. (I’ve never come across so many naps in so short a time.) Puck gives Bottom an ass’s head and puts love potion into Titania’s eyes so when she wakes so she’ll fall for Bottom. But he screws up the other mission by putting love potion into Lysander’s eyes instead of Demetrius’ so Lysander falls for Helena and rejects Hermia. (Got it? Do pay attention please!)

 I remembered why I’d always loathed this now-he-loves-her-now-he-doesn’t stuff and that blasted ass’s head…it’s just so… what’s the word? Insufferable will do. 

But in this production, several popular ‘80s songs (and why not? Shakespeare would have loved it) sung by a vigorously dancing and tuneful cast were belted out with such spirit and energy that it cheered me up. That was one thing. Another was those rude mechanicals who played their high comedy to much better effect than I’d ever seen before, better than in any professional productions. For once funny. The Wall and Thisbe were pure comic delights.  Finally, this is a spectacular cheer-you-up pantomimic comedy and the young people got that 100% right without a hint of the sometimes-dreary Royal Shakespeare Company reverence.

It was enormous fun. Our grandson cool and wonderful (but I would say that, wouldn’t I?) and his opposite number Lysander also spectacular, Puck is obviously destined for theatre later in life. Overall, it was an uproarious, funny event. 

This was proof, as if we needed it, that laughing, clapping, letting-your-hair-down, discarding restraint and having a ball is just the sort of tonic that all of us need.