'Twelfth Night' and 'Richard III'

If you’ve never enjoyed Shakespeare, two plays being done in repertory at The Belasco Theatre may very well convert you. Done in the original Elizabethan style, with great attention spent on authenticity of music and fashion, both Twelfth Night and Richard III offer superb entertainment.

The performance begins before the play actually starts, as the audience is invited to come early to watch the actors prepare for their roles. The “women’s” faces are painted stark white in the style of Japanese Kabuki theater. They are corseted and adorned into their voluminous dresses. The chandeliers are lowered so that the candles providing stage light are lit. The theater lights are kept on, so the actors can look directly at the audience as we watch them. In fact, throughout Richard III, the king speaks directly to the audience and his henchmen enlist our support as his “countrymen.”

Twelfth Night is a comedy caused by mistaken identities and confusion. The incomparable Mark Rylance (Boeing, Boeing, Jerusalem) a wonderful comedian, plays Olivia, a beautiful wealthy woman, spurning the advances of Lord Orsino (Liam Brennan). In Shakespeare's time, men played women’s roles and three of the main characters in this version of Twelfth Night are female – here, all played by men.

Rylance glides as if floating across the stage. His fluttery hand gestures show his dismay and, later, infatuation with Orsino's young squire, Viola, a young woman in disguise (actor Samuel Barnett playing a girl dressed as a boy). Rylance’s portrayal is subtle yet believable. It becomes more comical later when he’s histrionic, falling to the floor and figuratively throwing himself at the young man. The humor is that the audience knows Olivia has rejected a real man and instead has fallen for a woman disguised as a man.