This summer at the Oregon Shakespeare Festival in Ashland, a trio of plays interrogates topics of representation, identity and the power of storytelling, while remaining accessible enough for a weekend getaway or a family vacation — no advanced Bardolatry degree required.
On through October in OSF’s Angus Bowmer Theatre, Oscar Wilde’s classic 1895 comedy of Victorian manners, The Importance of Being Earnest, directed by Desdemona Chiang, is about two posh British gentlemen friends, Algernon Moncrieff (Hao Feng) and John Worthing (Julian Remulla), who discover that each has a secret: One travels to the city under an assumed identity “Ernest,” the other to the countryside to care for a fictional sick relative.
Wilde is a queer icon, convicted in 1895 of “gross indecency,” or in other words, homosexuality at a time when it was illegal in England, and sentenced to two years’ hard labor in prison. And while there’s nothing overtly queer-coded in Earnest, the two main characters must lead secret lives to escape the stricture of Victorian society and be themselves: The subtext speaks for itself.
The central love story, as quick-witted and quippy as ever, is heteronormative — it was the 1890s, after all — and the plot develops as each man’s ruse is uncovered because the women they love have always dreamed of marrying a man named “Earnest,” or rather, “Ernest” — pun intended.
With sumptuous scenic and costume design from Se Hyun Oh and Melissa Torchia, Earnest’s setting at OSF is 19th-century colonial Malaya (present-day Malaysia), and the script is lightly edited to suit the scene. Meanwhile, the 19th-century-influenced social mores are familiar enough, post-TV shows like The Gilded Age and Downton Abbey.
The cast is roundly excellent, but Thilini Dissanayake as young dreamer Cecily Cardew and Kiki deLohr as upper-crust Victorian “it girl” Gwendolen Fairfax, the two women vying for an “Ernest” of their own, steal the show.
While still a worthwhile endeavor, the weakest of the three plays is William Shakespeare’s The Merry Wives of Windsor, also on through October in OSF’s outdoor Allen Elizabethan Theatre.
Windsor, directed by Terri McMahon, is a broad comedy and one of Shakespeare’s lesser works, focused on the gluttonous drunken knight Sir John Falstaff (Daniel T. Parker), who tries to rizz-up two high-society ladies — Mistress Margaret Page (Royer Bockus) and Mistress Alice Ford (Amy Kim Waschke), together a highlight of the show — with the same love note.
Once Falstaff is found out, he pays the price, with Real Housewives of Elizabethan England outcomes.
Most Shakespeare is updated these days, but this production’s scenic and costume design — from Efren Delgadillo Jr. and Susan Tsu, respectively — is all over the place without adding much to the source text: motorcycle gangs meet the 1920s with nods toward hip hop and Elizabethan England.
Still, the jokes are plentiful, Parker excels at the physical comedy (don’t miss the bit when Falstaff hides in the laundry basket, only to get dumped into the Thames), and all in all, the play is likable, despite its shortcomings. Crucially, themes of loving who you want, no matter what you’re told, remain relevant.
Last, Stephen Sondheim’s 1987 blockbuster Tony Award-winning musical Into the Woods, on through October, returns to OSF, a reprisal of sorts of OSF’s 2014 Woods production with TV and film’s Anthony Heald (The Silence of the Lambs, Boston Public) returning as the Narrator/Mystery man, and Catherine E. Coulson (Twin Peaks’ “Log Lady,” who died in 2015,) returning as a video projection in the role of Jack and the Beanstalk’s Giant.
With a book by James Lapine, Into the Woods, this time with music and theatrical direction from Amanda Dehnert and choreography from Ellenore Scott, retells mixed-up classic fairytales from the aforementioned Jack to Cinderella to Little Red Riding Hood and Rapunzel for comic effect with a postmodern lens on how the stories we tell affect our sense of self, fulfillment, and happiness.
Delgadillo’s scenic design is more focused here, and Linda Roethke’s costume design features up-to-date visual punchlines. Cinderella’s stepsisters, Florinda (Ellen Soraa Nikbakht) and Lucinda (Kiki DeLohr), are Charli XCX Brat-coded, just for one example.
OSF might not be known for musicals, but the orchestra, with rotating conductors, handles Sondheim’s trademark dissonance well, and the voices are strong all around, especially Rhea Bradley as a feisty Little Red Riding Hood.
For ticket prices and a complete schedule including the full list of plays presented in OSF’s 90th season, go to OSFAshland.org. Performances run through October.