A Midsummer Night’s Dream, 18 July 2024

The Classical Theatre of Harlem’s free production of a Midsummer Night’s Dream in Marcus Garvey Park was a glamorous spectacle that struck one of the most impressive balances between Shakespearean language and contemporary “updates” that I have ever seen. But its prowess went far beyond that. 

When pursuing my theatre degree, I study Shakespeare more extensively than the average theater student. I’ve fully scored two Shakespeare productions, written numerous papers, created academic designs, attended productions at every level from middle school to Broadway to Shakespeare’s Globe, competed in classical monologue contests, read an impressive number of speculative biographies, entertained numerous bizarre questions about his existence, explored modern adaptations across mediums, researched the architecture of The Globe Theater… suffice to say, I know my stuff. In all my history with the Bard’s work, I have never seen a production so easily and readily understood, and thoroughly enjoyed by an audience. The audience was fully engaged and hanging on every word – and with Shakespeare, that’s extremely rare without serious script modifications. My hat is off to The Classical Theatre of Harlem and director Carl Cofield for igniting or rekindling a love for Shakespearean stories in the common man, while truly embodying the Shakespearean ideal, “this above all, to thine own self be true.” The production was wonderfully true to Shakespeare’s intent.

I’m thoroughly impressed. Shakespeare never intended for his plays to become the lofty, highbrow, inaccessible experiences that much of today’s society finds intimidating. He wrote for the masses; in his day, most theatergoers were groundlings, who paid a very small amount to stand through an entire performance and drunkenly heckle the actors. Shakespeare’s brand of theater was not held in reverence as the pinnacle of art. The comedies are often physical and sexual in nature, the tragedies over exaggerated with a heavy-handed hint of relatable madness, and the histories critical and bloody. If you want to understand how theatre was viewed in Shakespeare’s day, I encourage you to look at his plays within his plays (in the case of A Midsummer Night’s Dream, that would be Pyramus and Thisbe). It is crude and flawed, mocked by Shakespeare’s characters who temporarily hold roles of audience members. Even the process is deeply flawed, precise, ludicrous, contradictory, and willing to do anything for a cheap laugh. The Classical Theatre of Harlem portrayed this brilliantly – the upstaging of Peter Quince by Nick Bottom was truly phenomenal, and the rest of the rude mechanicals really committed to faithful portrayals – I especially enjoyed the wall, the lion, and moonshine.

Shakespeare is famous for not writing stage directions. As such, his plays are often imagined in worlds other than where he wrote them to be, and directors and scholars infer presence of songs and music through the spoken lines. For example, if someone is asked to stop singing, presumably they were singing. We also often lean on the rich heritage of portrayals, additions, and stagings of the multitude of productions done between the original versions, which the Bard  staged himself, and today. The Classical Theatre of Harlem struck the perfect balance of adding music as transitions and Puck’s incredible vocal triumphs for his narrative monologues, while not turning the production into a full scale musical. Dance choreography between scenes was fun, but not distracting, and gave the audience a moment to reflect, and taken the previous scene to prepare for the next one.

But the active transmitting of the story falls largely to the vocal inflection and physicality of the actors who “strut upon the stage.” In this case, those elements made the story distinctly steeped and African American culture. Everything from Helena’s comments about being “little and low” to Hermia’s earring removal in order to fight Helena, was enjoyed and appreciated by the demographic of the audience. The authenticity of the actors and sprinkling of subtle yet well placed modern references, had the audience laughing and celebrating similarities across time and culture, and the recognition of how much fun art and theatre are when the characters are flawed, human, and backed into difficult positions that forfeit their semblance of choice to be free to be their authentic selves.

The design elements of the show were very strong, (projections a little cheesy at moments), particularly sound – being able to hear every word at an outdoor production is incredibly commendable. My only real criticism is in the extremity of Lysander’s transformation when anointed with the flower petals. No other character had a reaction that bold, and I think if you’re going to make a choice, like having an actor suddenly speak in a very heavy accent, it’s important to do it across the board for consistency.

Overall, this production is truly phenomenal, and well worth a midsummer night’s evening in the park.

I did not attend this performance on a press pass.