In the role of the Queen (the King's second wife), in the first act of Cymbeline, Martha Henry, lovingly removes a live albino ferret from her bosom and delicately places the creature on the ground as she takes her regal exit with the leashed weasel leading the way. At one point during the second half of the play she enters with a white fur stole around her shoulders that clearly reveals her change of heart regarding the beloved pet thereby giving a whole new level of meaning to her role as the "wicked step-mother."
I mention this only because Cymbeline is another of Shakespeare's "lesser" works that, if you should go by any number of plot synopses, seems unfathomable in its intent, obscure in its plot, and perfunctory in its construction. Don't let the critics put you off, in the capable hands of this cast, the play is fast moving, compelling and poignant as a romantic tale that echoes (some might say recycles) characters and plot turns from earlier works. Of all the great plays, only Tempest remained to be written after Cymbeline.
Next to Henry, anchoring the cast is James Blendick as Cymbeline. Blendick must make us believe in a wholly improbable series and turns of events, but toward the end of the play when Cymbeline is given to recognizing his two lost sons, he actually makes something of it so that we feel a very touching moment. Ron Kennell is wonderful as the comic and clottish Cloten, the Queen's son by a former marriage. Claire Jullien, as Imogen, in a role that has elements of Rosalind in it, always gains our attention as do Dan Chameroy and Dion Johnstone as Posthumus and Iachimo respectively, who spar as if they were playing Othello and Iago. One of the most welcome bits of casting were the two outcast sons of Cymbeline, Guiderius and Arviragus (Stephen Gartner and Gordon S. Miller) who are given some of the most moving lines in the play in the form of a funeral prayer.
Victoria Wallace is listed as Designer which would seem to indicate that she was responsible for both set and costumes. Both worked extremely well with the costumes especially bridging ancient Britain to modern Rome in seamless armor to Prada.
Fight Director James Binkley once again took the lazy route as they so often do at the Stratford Festival and staged the major battle scene in the second half of the play in slow motion. If I see one more slow motion battle scene in a Shakespearean play at Stratford I swear to God I'm going to run onto the stage and pick up a sword myself and start clashing steel with cries of "For Christ's sake the playwright knew that everyone is getting sleepy about this time, that's why he put in the big fight scene NOW -- IT'S NOT A DREAM SEQUENCE!"
Other than that, it was a terrific production.