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THEATER REVIEW: JULIUS CAESAR |
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Will Geer and Will Shakespeares toga party
By Ed Rampell
I have a friend named Fred McKinnon whos a Manhattan playwright. Above his computer, printer, etc. “ his work space where the magic takes place, except when Fred is globetrotting, doing research, play hopping at Londons West End or recharging his muse at writers colonies from Hawaii to Massachusetts “ is a postcard bearing a picture of William Shakespeare and the words: So I havent written lately. Neither has Shakespeare. Perhaps you have to be a scribe to fully appreciate this joke, but this is one of the funniest things Ive ever read.
Of course, if youd written immortal masterpieces such as Julius Caesar, youd be excused for being a slacker of a pen pal. Unlike modern scribblers such as Fred and your humble and most obedient servant, without benefit of the Internet, word processing, drama format software, etc., the poetic genius from Stratford-upon-Avon rendered classic after classic for the ages, using only a lowly low tech quill, ink and parchment. Yet the angels sang when Shakespeare wrote, and its astonishing how many expressions still in use in the English language are derived from the Shakespearean canon.
For example, consider Julius Caesar, which the Will Geer Theatricum Botanicum premiered June 6 in its amphitheatre under Malibus starry, starry skies. Its common knowledge that the phrase et tu, Brutus?', which has come to epitomize backstabbing (literally!), originated in Shakespeares high drama about the lowdown Roman Empire. But did you know that the term for someone speaking gibberish also wittily began in Caesar, when Casca (Alan Blumenfeld) quipped: but those that understood him smiled at one another and shook their heads; but, for mine own part, it was Greek to me. Caesars right hand man, Marc Antony (Aaron Hendry), not Mahatma Gandhi, proclaimed: Cry 'Havoc,' and let slip the dogs of war. Even that popular populist 1960s exclamation in the affirmative by Black Panthers arguably emanated from this play when, during his funeral oration, Antony cried: To stir men's blood: I only speak right on.
But while so many of Shakespeares wondrous words are still perennials, it is the syntheses of swordplay and wordplay, rhyme and theme, that makes Julius Caesar as rabblerousing and timely today as it was when it opened at the Globe Theatre in 1599. As the hotheaded Antony wisely observes: The evil that men do lives after them. Indeed, 510 years later the plot about plotters conspiring to assassinate the head of the ancient worlds superpower remains resonant. Like the Rome of antiquity, with more than 700 military bases scattered around the world the United States of America has become an empire beset by internal inequities and endless enemies and wars abroad. Using the pretext of 9/11, just as Caesar had 2,044 years before him, George W. Bush grabbed unprecedented power, diminishing the role and rule of a representative republican form of governance as he assumed greater omnipotence. Like Caesar awaiting to be crowned absolute dictator of imperial Rome by the senate, Bushs imperial presidency, unitary executive, warrant-less surveillance, extraordinary rendition, prolonged detention without charges, torture, etc., were the tyranny of a latter day decider and would-be emperor.
Julius Caesar opens with the Roman throng feting their conquering hero, who displays blithe hubris and arrogantly disdains portents of disaster. Similarly, that prating prancing preening prick of a president enjoyed widespread approval ratings when the uniform-clad wannabe warrior prematurely proclaimed mission accomplished on an aircraft carriers deck for a preemptive war were still, alas, mired in six years on.
From their 21st century vantage point, audiences may congratulate themselves that unlike Cassius cabal, we are too cultivated to settle political disputes at dagger point. On the other hand, our too, too loyal opposition caved, with many Democrats voting for the PATRIOT Act, to authorize the invasion of Iraq under false pretences, and supported too many Bush measures. To make matters worse, Bush was reelected and although ultimately repudiated by the electorate, now that hes out of power our spineless senators decline to charge him with war crimes, etc. Meanwhile, his Antony, Dick Cheney, continues to sow discord with impunity. As Cassius (Melora Marshall) said: Why, man, he doth bestride the narrow world, Like a Colossus, and we petty men Walk under his huge legs and peep about¦
But time will tell who were truly more refined: the Americans, who cowered in the face of despotism, or the Romans who, as Shakespeares most famous fictional character, Hamlet, said, [took] arms against a sea of troubles, And by opposing end[ed] them,' literally turning their oppressor into a bloodstained quivering mass of orange Julius (played by Carl Palmer). In another half a millennium, history shall pass judgment on who were more civilized.
Caesars political overtones befit the Will Geer Theatricum Botanicum, which was founded after the leftwing cowboy actor (1950s Broken Arrow and Winchester 73) refused to testify before the House Un-American Activities Committee and was blacklisted. Instead of fading away into obscurity, Geer turned his land in Topanga Canyon near Malibu into an outdoor theatre, where he also grew every plant Shakespeare wrote about. Geer went on to co-star in the 1954 classic made by blacklisted talents about striking Chicano miners, Salt of the Earth, and in the beloved 1970s CBS-TV series, The Waltons, playing Grandpa Walton.
Probably the highest compliment I can pay the Theatricums production of Julius Caesar is that its worthy of the bard. It is, to use Brutus (Mike Peebler) words, a savage spectacle, with a cast of dozens. Considering that I recently saw the one woman show, Kick, starring DeLanna Studi and the two-actor drama A Number co-starring John Heard, a cast of 40 is of near epic proportion onstage. Ellen Geer deftly directs the mass scenes, which are somewhat reminiscent of Salt of the Earth. The mise-en-scene of the battle sequences, as sword drawn Roman centurions romp over the bards boards, are excitingly well-choreographed, making excellent use of the open air Topanga setting. The slow motion assassination of Caesar is harrowingly cinematic.
In the best gender bending acting since Cate Blanchett played Bob Dylan in 2007s Im Not There, the productions most outstanding performance is delivered by Melora Marshall as Cassius. She plays him as an overwrought conspirator, a fanatical devotee of the cause whose own ambition and zeal compels Cassius to take up arms against the man who would be king.
Julius Caesar will be performing through Sept. 26. For more information: call 310/455-3723 or see: www.Theatricum.com.
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