Goodnight Desdemona

(Good Morning Juliet)

by Ann-Marie MacDonald

directed by Jose Zayas

at the Loeb Experimental Theater

May 4 and 6 at 7:30 p.m.

May 5 at 7 and 9:30 p.m.

Goodnight Desdemona (Good Morning Juliet), currently at the Loeb Ex, leaves one in mourning for the play it could have been.

The cast is one of the most talented, cohesive and dexterous to grace a Harvard stage in some time; and for a few aching moments, at the opening of the play, they give us scenes from Shakespeare that are truly lovely. The fond hope arises in one's breast-- perhaps they will abandom the sophomoric Shakespearean parody into which they have been forced and perform Twelfth Nightor As You Like It. instead.

They don't, of course.

Instead, they carry out the tedious antics of Ann-Marie Macdonald's play for two and half frustrating hours, each singing his character's one note with admirable fidelity until the bitter end. It is impossible to know just how they would have managed with real Shakespeare--perhaps there would be some wobbling in those higher ranges that the present play does not attempt--but a glorious failure would have been at least more satisfying than this perfectly executed trifle.

Goodnight Desdemona is that fear some creature, the play within a play Constance Ledbelly (Lindsey Richardson), a frumpish assistant professor from Queens, is struggling with the slings and arrows of outrageous academia. She endures an arrogant and exploitative senior professor, his disdainful girlfriend, and the ridicule of her peers, who dismiss her theory that Romeo and Juliet and Othello were adapted by Shakespeare from lost originals in which they were comedies.

Soon enough, through some incoherent bit of comic book magic, Constance is sucked through her trashcan into the world of Othello, just as Iago is about to play his fatal trick and convince the Moor to murder his wife, Desdemona. Constance exposes the deception and goes on to become Othello's favorite and Desdemona's best friend. She learns, as she had long suspected, that the "real" Desdemona is no fainting flower; rather, she yearns for a life of combat, such as she assumes Constance must enjoy in the Kingdom of Academe.

From this moment on, the play elaborates the blindingly original premise that modern life would appear pretty silly if described in Elizabethan English. When Constance, who soon slips into iambic pentameter like all the other characters, describes someone as a creep and Desdemona is mystified, she says absent-mindedly: "Creep--it's colloquial for 'base and noisome knave."'

Later on, the warlike Desdemona misinterprets Constance's complaint about the "sacred cows" of Academe and announces her desire to slay the bovine monsters. It is this level of misunderstanding--the utterly conventional and predictable--that MacDonald's play attains, and never attempts to surpass.

But soon Iago is up to his old tricks, and, in a clever scene, turns Desdemona against Constance with the same words that had convinced Othello in the opening scene. Constance's only escape is another sudden jump, this time into Romeo and Juliet, where the abundant joys of sexual innuendo are added to those of Elizabethan paraphrase.

The central conceit here is that Romeo and Juliet are both just horny, whiny teenagers, and that Romeo is actually gay. Thus both lovers fall for Constance, thinking her to be a boy, and both cross-dress to gain her attention, leading to gems such as: "Doth no one in Verona sail straight?".

In the end, of course, everyone gets the chance to learn some life lessons: for example, that real life is more complex than a Shakespeare play. The same cannot be said for Goodnight Desdemona, whose sensibility and pacing are exactly those of a sitcom.

Within the play, however, the actors--each of whom, except Constance, plays several roles--demonstrate more talent than the script can readily accommodate. Lindsey Richardson's Constance is appropriately timid and awkward, and while her mannerisms tend towards the cute, this is no more than the character demands.

As Juliet, Nora Dickey is winningly zany, jumping for any chance at a tragic suicide, and she relishes her lascivious double-entendres so much that we can't help but join in. Erik Amblad is surprisingly good in his brief serious scene from Othello, and plays both Tybalt and Constance's boss with doltish pride tempered by the right hint of self-mockery; his turn in drag, as Juliet's Nurse is low comedy but well done.

The real stars of the evening are Andrew Barth, as Iago and Romeo, and Stephanie Smith as Mercutio and Desdemona. It is tempting to imagine them as Viola and Malvolio or Beatrice and Benedick in some future HRDC production. Barth is wonderfully vicious as Iago, and his Romeo, while predictably over-the-top, retains more grace and wit than the buffoonish comedy demands Smith's comic zeal and exuberance make her the focus of every scene she is in; her Mercutio is delightful, and her Desdemona is as perfect a performance of that sadly banal role as could be imagined.

The whole cast demonstrates a startling physical prowess, as well. Elaborate swordfights, dramatic pratfalls, and dirty dancing are all executed beautifully, as is a graceful pantomime to the music of Pachelbel's Canon at the end of the play.

A great deal of credit is due to Amalie Weber, the choreographer, who has managed to effect the transition from ordinary motion to dance so that, for a few moments as the music starts, the actors seem stylized, abstract. The occasional use of loud rock music, like the psychedelic light show which indicates Constance's fall into the play, is unnecessary, but it is never a serious flaw.

It is impossible, then, to recommend that one stay away from Good night Desdemona; there is too much good acting to be missed. At the same time, the idiocy of the play is grating, and at two and a half hours, it is distinctly too long. The only thing to do, perhaps, is to see the play, savor the bits of real Shakespeare, and dream of greater things to come.