Troilus And Cressida CBC

SANWAL

Richard Monette’s 2003 production of Troilus and Cressida for the Stratford (Ontario) Shakespeare Festival with David Snelgrove and Claire Jullien in the title roles. Set during the Trojan Wars, William Shakespeare’s hugely powerful drama  is both a story of doomed  love and a representation of the futility of war. It is also an extraordinarily topical enquiry into ethics, value and the slippery  nature of truth.  CBC Radio 1:  2004   Two Episodes  Director.........Richard Monette Music........Keith Thomas  Production Design......Ann Curtis Costume.......Ann Curtis Cast: David Snelgrove Troilus Claire Jullien Cressida Stephen Ouimette Thersites Bernard Hopkins Pandarus Peter Donaldson Ulysses Aaron Franks Deiphobus Andy Velasquez Hector Brad Rudy Menelaus Chick Reid Andromache Daniela Lama Alexander David Shelley Patroclus Gordon S. Miller\ Antenor Ian Deakin Nestor Jamie Robinson Achilles Jeffrey Renn Ajax Joanna Schellenberg Cassandra Keith Dinicol Calchas Linda Prystawska Helen Paul Dunn Helenus Paul Soles Priam, King of Troy Roger Shank Diomedes Tim Campbell Paris Timothy Askew Aeneas Tom Albrecht Margareton Wayne Best Agamemnon "The Anti-'Romeo and Juliet'" For more than 400 years most criticism of "Troilus and Cressida" was devoted to proving Shakespeare had nothing to do with it. Its unrelievedly bitter tone, its depiction of a world where there is no room for heroism or romantic love, its pervasive imagery of sex, disease and waste hardy fit with sentimental views of the Bard of Avon. Yet, after the outrages of the 20th century and this, the play seems more relevant than ever. The current production, only the third in Stratford's history, is far superior to David William's disastrous staging in 1985 that seemed more determined to shock than make sense of the play. The great virtue of Richard Monette's production is how clearly it tells the tale. The plot involving the Trojan Troilus' love for Cressida, daughter of a Greek priest, is played mostly upstage and is pitted against the action downstage involving the Greeks' attempt after seven pointless years of war to encourage their greatest hero Achilles to end his fit of sulking to fight again. Just as the Trojan Pandarus woos his niece to love Troilus, so Ulysses woos Achilles to fight by making it seem the Greeks favour the ox-like Ajax as their champion. But the world, at war for an unworthy cause, ruins any possibility for romantic love or true heroism. Monette's production is marred by occasional excess. He makes Helen, who is supposed to be the most beautiful woman in the world, into a sex-crazed blond bimbo and Paris, her Trojan lover, into a brain-fried surfer dude complete with silly blond wig. Shakespeare may not give Helen any hidden depths, but we do have to see how two nations could go to war over her. As for Paris, he wants to keep Helen not but he's so horny but because three goddesses awarded her to him as a prize even though she was already married. Monette has the two deliver their lines while trying out various sexual positions so that we can't hear what they say for all the panting. Achilles and his lover Patroclus may be the only homosexual couple Shakespeare depicted. But having Patroclus flash himself to Ulysses as some kind of rebuke makes no sense since the Greeks were so used to male nudity and to homosexuality. Monette has decided that Pandarus should come down with some sort of venereal disease after Cressida leaves him signalled to the audience with increasing layers of horror makeup. This sentimentalizes a character in an unsentimental play who likely already has the "diseases" (plural) he refers to from the very start. The rap song Keith Thomas has given him in Act 1 is totally out of character with the rest of the play as is the track from Nine Inch Nails at the end. Monette makes doomed love the thread to guide us through the plethora of scenes and characters though at the expense of the equally important political scenes that don't receive the same degree of detail. If one can look beyond these flaws, there are some fine performances on offer. Chief among these is Bernard Hopkins, who accomplishes the difficult task of making us believe Pandarus truly cares for Cressida even while we censure his unchecked libido for any male under thirty. For the first time Cressida's parting from Pandarus has real emotional resonance. Also outstanding is Stephen Ouimette, who manages to give Shakespeare's grungiest, bitterest fool Thersites a deadpan humour that works. In the titles roles David Snelgrove and Claire Jullien work very well together. Jullien gives Cressida a frivolous nature from the start so that her later betrayal of Troilus is believable. Snelgrove captures the idealism of Troilus' ardour and shows how Troilus channels his frustration over losing Cressida into lust for battle. Both in their weeping and wailing miss a sense of fatality as their vow of Act 3 comes terribly true. Jeffrey Renn brings out the humour in the dim-witted Ajax. Geordie Johnson, subbing for Andy Velásquez, is a noble but vulnerable Hector. As his rival Achilles, Jamie Robinson fumes but can't match the physical or vocal presence of Johnson. David Shelley is thankfully not the effete Patroclus as he is so often played and brings a sense of tragedy to Patroclus' death. Peter Donaldson would be a fine Ulysses if he could emphasize more fully the cunning that informs his every speech. As Paris and Helen, Tim Campbell and Linda Prystawska can't help the cartoons Monette has made of them, but even so Prystawska doesn't make sense of her lines. Andrew Massingham, subbing for Wayne Best, plays Agamemnon more as if her were a baseball coach than noble leader. Roger Shank's flat line readings as Diomedes don't help in explaining why Cressida should give up Troilus for him. Ann Curtis's design helpfully sets the earth-toned Trojans apart from the black-clad Greeks, but Patroclus wrap-around terry skirt seems anachronistic as do the black Speedos Ajax and Achilles wear. Kevin Fraser's captures the mood of every scene and his use of spotlights helps reinforce parallels among the various couples. The normally excellent fight director John Stead seems to run out of ideas how to make the long sequence of one-on-one battles in Act 5 interesting. "Troilus and Cressida" is so seldom done at Stratford many will not want to wait another 18 years for a better one to come along. If Monette had managed to hold back on his various excesses, this staging would be much more recommendable since it so clearly reveals the play as a kind of anti-"Romeo and Juliet". Given the state of the world, "Troilus and Cressida" deserves to be programmed more often if only to show those in the past have thought our own worst thoughts. ©Christopher Hoile Note: This review is a Stage Door exclusive.

This recording is part of the Old Time Radio collection.