Caroline Toal and Farhang Ghajar in Twelfth Night.Dahlia Katz/Supplied
- Title: Twelfth Night
- Adapted and directed by: Gregory Prest
- Performed by: Caroline Toal, Ghazal Azarbad, Farhang Ghajar, Rick Roberts, Navtej Sandhu, Mike Shara, Steven Sutcliffe, Justin Otto
- Company: Canadian Stage
- Venue: High Park Amphitheatre
- City: Toronto
- Year: Runs until Sept. 6
Whoever coined the truism that you should never make theatre with animals or children – no matter what, they’ll upstage the other actors – likely never attended Dream in High Park.
Every year, thousands of Torontonians, their kids and their dogs travel to Toronto’s West End for an outdoor production of a play by William Shakespeare. Invariably, their experience is shaped by the conditions of High Park: Is it too hot? Too chilly? Is a squirrel intent on stealing the snacks you so carefully tucked away for later? Is it raining? (Or, in the case of this year’s scheduled opening night, so smoky that the performance had to be cancelled?)
As such, the challenge for a given Dream’s director is twofold: First, they must craft a show that pleases the Shakespeare purists in the amphitheatre. That’s no small feat, given the chosen play must be pared down into a 90-minute cut. But they also have to leave enough flexibility for the production to adapt to whatever the conditions of the park may be on a given day.
Justin Otto, Navtej Sandhu, and Mike Shara in Twelfth Night.Dahlia Katz/Supplied
Twelfth Night, directed and adapted by Gregory Prest with an emphasis on the play’s central love triangle, skillfully walks the line between silly and solemn. Prest’s cut is stronger in its second half: Newcomers to Shakespeare’s comedy may struggle to keep up with crucial plot points, as well as the play’s many, many names, in the beginning.
But on the whole, the production sings. (Literally, sometimes: A few of sound designer and composer Olivia Wheeler’s songs sound like sea shanties, while others are more contemplative, underscored by a lilting lute.) Actors Caroline Toal and Ghazal Azarbad volley their heartsick lines as if competing at a pickleball tournament. Mike Shara, Navtej Sandhu and Justin Otto, meanwhile, strike gold in Twelfth Night’s funnier, less anguished interludes.
The story’s much the same as it’s always been, minus its opening. “If music be the food of love, play on” is replaced here with a number of quotes from Shakespeare’s other plays. Clown Feste (Steven Sutcliffe) welcomes us into the amphitheatre with a prayer to the heavens – no rain, please, no rain! – and the assertion that “love is merely a madness,” nabbed from Rosalind in As You Like It.
Steven Sutcliffe in Twelfth Night.Dahlia Katz/Supplied
We soon meet Viola (Toal, who recycles the warmth that made her Anne Shirley so irresistible at last year’s Stratford Festival), stranded in the mythical land of Illyria and separated from her twin brother Sebastian (Ori Black). Viola soon disguises herself as a man, working as a page for a duke named Orsino (and with whom she quickly plummets in love).
The problem, of course, is that Orsino loves Olivia (Azarbad), an Illyrian noble’s daughter, who in turn loves “Cesario” – a.k.a. Viola. The love triangle then twists in on itself, riffing on the fluidity of gender and sexuality with a surprisingly modern bent (and with hardly a word changed by Prest).
Trouble, meanwhile, is brewing in Olivia’s court: The cantankerous Malvolio (Rick Roberts) has found himself the target of a series of mean-spirited pranks by Sir Andrew Aguecheek (Otto), Sir Toby Belch (Shara) and Maria (Sandhu). The trio of tricksters devises a plan to make Malvolio think Olivia has fallen madly in love with him – in fact, she’s repulsed by the grump, and even more so by the garish yellow stockings he’s been duped into wearing in her presence.
Rick Roberts (blindfolded) in Twelfth Night.Dahlia Katz/Supplied
Prest stages the work, delicious in its complicated tangle of false identities and unrequited crushes, with a light touch. His interjections are minimal, and especially past the midway point, his adaptation hardly shows its seams. A few production elements could be smoother: Wheeler’s sound design fuzzes the actors’ diction into near-obscurity at times, while costume designer Sim Suzer’s choice of hat for Feste completely blocks Sutcliffe’s face whenever he turns left or right. But by and large, the fizzy rom-com goes off without a hitch.
If there’s one thing I enjoyed most about Twelfth Night, however, it’s the ways in which the production accommodates the vast array of audiences who might happen to stumble across the High Park Amphitheatre.
On Sunday evening – rain-free! – I watched as young children happily sketched Suzer’s set and costumes, eavesdropping as they asked intelligent questions about the storylines they didn’t understand. I smelled picnics from some of Toronto’s most beloved dining establishments (and somewhat regretted not picking up a pizza from Blondies on my way to the park). I smiled as young infants fell asleep in their parents’ arms, and as hounds barked happily on the surrounding trails.
Don’t make theatre with kids and dogs? Please. At Dream in High Park, the park’s the thing – and on this occasion, the play’s not half-bad, either.