No one would ever accuse Andrei Serban, the ART's premiere regisseur of not having a fertile imagination. The problem is that spreading too much manure over an garden or an idea can result in a bumper crop of weeds which obscure what few spectacular blooms might spring up. This current production of "Pericles, Prince of Tyre", an Elizabethan romance which critics suggest was only completed by the Bard, is a multimedia extravaganza, the sort only an amply-funded and University-backed theatre can afford. The show features about two dozen performers playing more than forty characters, contemporary theatrical effects, elaborate and often bizarre costumes, live and recorded video, plus the auteur's trademark, erotic nudity. The result is still close to Ben Jonson's dismissive comment that Pericles is a "mouldy tale" strung together "of scraps from every dish", or as we'd say today, "leftovers."
For this outing into Serbanized Shakespeare--he's reworked seven previously, three at the ART--Andrei has seized on video as a way to extend the range of his storytelling, at least during the first three acts, the most debated portion of the text. These efforts, credited to Romanian stage and screen actorDan Nutu, here undertaking his first major stage design assignment, are wildly varied. Backprojected onto a single screen overlooking the stage, the segments range from Vogue-style nude shots of the King and his daughter to home movie scenes made up the coast at Crane's Beach, plus some clips from travel documentaries and a scene from an early Bollywood production. There are also extreme closeups involving dialogue with the hero onstage which could either be done live from backstage or recorded earlier. The result is confused to say the least. The only really effective part is the use of maps to illuminate the relationship between locales mentioned in the text. Surprisingly, for the one point where projected text might be helpful, the riddle at the beginning of the action, there's distracting imagery instead. And towards the end, when all this folderol might be drawn back together, the technique is dropped.
The costumery by Gabriel Berry has much the same effect or lack thereof. It ranges from a grotesque outfit featuring a skull headdress, kothurni, and a maribou cape suggesting something from anime for Thomas Derrah as King Antiochus--and maribou over nothing from Georgia Hatzis as his daughter to rockstar leather and tramp wear for the brothel scene in Act IV. Hatzis also gets to go topless as the goddess Diana in a Cretean-inspired outfit wearing wings/antlers on her back. Such displays got Cherry Jones started here. Let's hope the next time out this fine young actress gets to display the acting qualities she showed last summer as Katherine in "Henry V" on the common. Derrah also plays merry King Simonides in a Michelin-Man suit inspired by the Cirque de Soleil, while his daughter wears something equally bizarre. At least he doesn't have to wear a lobster on his head as senior actor Jeremy Geidt does when playing a fisherman. Geidt gets to be properly dignified as Helicanus, the hero's counselor back in Tyre and the secondary narrator, however.
The narration, originally spoken entirely by Gower--Chaucer's contemporary credited with the original story--here played by Sri Lankan born Yolande Bavan, has been divided between these two seasoned performers. Bavan had a major role in "Homebody, Kabul" at Trinity last year, but is better known internationally as a singer, particularly after taking over for Annie Ross with Lambert and Hendricks. This division of labor helps the play, but is also necessary since Bavan took over the role of the magician Cerimon, central to the action in the last two acts, from Earle Hyman. This diminutive woman thus gets resurrected by herself in a prologue dumbshow, appears dressed in Italianate Elizabethan garb as Gower, is swallowed up in robes as the magician, then takes her curtain-call out of a trunk. Said trunk incidentally contained dolls of the important characters in the story which she displays for no real effect from time to time while explaining things. Fortunately she's the most charming thing in the show.
The actor playing the title character, Robert Sella, makes a real effort, at least early on, to inject some life into this fate-battered soul, but doesn't really get a chance in the midst of Serban 's circus. Pericles is ultimately swallowed up in a mop-like gray wig for the important final scenes. The other ART regulars, Karen McDonald, and Will Lebow get to play over the top as Dioniza and Cleon, while Remo Airaldi gets to do his drag act as the Bawd. Serban favorite Mia Yoo as Pericles' wife Thaisa, Simonides daughter, speaks some of the most effective verse of the production. But unfortunately Pascale Armand, as Marina, her daughter, a capable enough Black actress just doesn't come up to the demands of that part, and isn't helped much by costume or staging either.
The most striking scene of the production, used to open the second half, is Thaisa's resurrection after being thrown overboard during a storm by Pericles' superstitious sailors, having seemingly died in childbirth. Probably done as a masque in the Elizabethan theatre, Serban has Yoo rise seemingly naked from a plexiglas coffin with enough water in the bottom to make reflections, while Bevan officiates as Cerimon, the magician. The ensemble in the meantime is performing a calisthenic dance probably left over from Ann Bogart's residency earlier in the season. She is also associated with Columbia, as of course is Robert Woodruff, the ART's new Artistic Director.
One gets the feeling that this scene might have been the first visual conception chosen for the play. Unfortunately, the idea of resurrection, also used in the prologue, never makes it to the end of penultimate scene between Pericles and Marina, the fruition of the drama. That is the real failure of this production. All the layering of theatrical and multimedia effects can't overcome the simple lack of a satisfying end. It's all much ado about nothing. True to the name of the title character, this spectacle wanders around in circles without really getting anywhere.