Theater Review: AS220’s Richard III

Tuesday, May 12, 2015

Thom Bassett, GoLocalProv Contributor

The title character, played by Michael Puppi.

It’s not often you get to heap praise on a play for what it doesn’t give the audience, but that’s exactly the case with Counter-Production Theatre Company’s Richard III, currently playing at AS220’s Black Box Theatre in Providence. The costuming is rudimentary, the lighting and sound design are basic, and the stage is essentially bare the entire performance. None of it matters, though, because what you have here, in place of larger, more showy productions, is a chance to directly experience what’s most important about any Shakespeare play: the language of the world’s greatest writer. And under Terry Shea’s direction, the performers together do a very commendable job of making the language come alive.

A Powerful Interpretation

That’s of course never an easy thing to do, but Richard III, one of Shakespeare’s best and most popular plays, presents some particularly strong challenges. For one thing, it’s unusually complicated. Much of the action depends on events that occur in Shakespeare’s earlier depiction of the Wars of the Roses—Henry VI, Pt. 3, a work not familiar to many theatregoers. For another, Richard’s machinations in pursuit of the crown proceed quickly along several lines; you know that Richard’s up to no good, but it can be hard to understand exactly what he’s doing and why. Finally, this is an exceptionally long play, and so it’s important to make judicious cuts that streamline the action while also holding the story together.

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So Shea and Counter-Production’s Artistic Director Ted Clement deserve a lot of credit for their shaping of the text. Combined with the very small performance space and lack of staging (which I didn’t miss at all), it keeps the action clipping along. Even more important, they preserve the core moral logic of the play by keeping intact several key women’s roles. Many versions of Richard III cut out or drastically reduce the presence of Margaret of Anjou, the deposed and humiliated former Lancaster queen; the Duchess of York, Richard’s mother; or Elizabeth, the widow of Edward IV, Richard’s older brother. This is a serious mistake, in my view: It’s these women, especially Margaret, who call Richard what he is, while noblemen, politicians, and clergy either hitch themselves to his wagon or try to slink away in self-preservation.

I do wish, though, they’d kept the focus entirely on the play’s language and their actors. A small screen at the back of the stage occasionally shows images intended to correlate with the words and actions in front of it. Many of the images show real creativity, but they don’t really add anything necessary. Why show a dripping strawberry, for example, when Richard juicily eating them as he demands the murder of children is a much more grotesque symbol?

A Strong Ensemble

Of course, without quality acting even the best script is useless, and collectively the company makes the grade. We must begin with the title character, played by Michael Puppi. Unfortunately, not every aspect of his performance works for me. To not even hint bodily at Richard’s deformities, despite the play’s numerous references to his hunchback, twisted leg, and withered arm, seems like a curious omission. And while I guess it’s a defensible choice to play Richard as gay, despite the utter absence of anything in the text to support the interpretation, too often he comes across as more campily preening than menacing. That said, Puppi does a very fine job depicting Richard’s viciousness and torment during his long fall into perdition after taking the throne. Then he’s convincingly dangerous, damned, and defiant.

In addition, while it might be Richard’s play, this production includes a strong set of supporting performers. Ted Clement plays George, Richard’s doomed brother, and he’s a particularly strong example of why this spare, even plain, production works so well: He recounts his dream of damnation while barely moving, but his broken voice gives us everything we need to understand the writhings of his soul.

But it’s Margaret, Elizabeth, and the Duchess of York who stand out most as supporting characters. C.L. Goff’s Margaret holds her hands piously in prayer but spits out hellish invective against all who she believes have wronged her. You can see why Richard tries to evade her when he can. Further, it’s hard to make lament work, particularly when in such an intimate setting the effects can be just noise in place of emotion, but as Elizabeth, Valerie Remillard Myette’s cries of despair are very affecting. Further, she’s marvelous when late in the play she turns Richard’s rhetoric against him. And Becky Minard gives us a Duchess of York broken by loss after loss but who can still summon the dignity and strength to condemn her murderous son.

To be honest, taken as a whole, this production doesn’t fully rise to the level of Trinity Rep or the Gamm (at least when those companies are at their best). But that observation is no criticism. The cast and crew of Counter-Productions nonetheless have created an admirable interpretation of a remarkable play that puts Shakespeare’s genius at the forefront. And for that they deserve our attention and applause.

Richard III runs May 15-16 at 7:00 p.m. and May 17 at 2:00 p.m. AS220 Black Box Theatre, 95 Empire Street, Providence, RI. Tickets $20.00. CPTCRI.com.

Theater Review: AS220’s Richard III

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