Tonight we went to the premiere of a charming production of a Woodstock-era A Midsummer Night's Dream imaginatively staged at a gorgeous space at the foot of Pier 64 by The Beautiful Soup Theater Collective under the direction of Steven Carl McCasland.
Actually, we think the space is part of Pier 63, and it was probably the most intimate setting we've ever seen for outdoor Shakespeare since a performance of Dream done by BACA (Brooklyn Arts and Cultural Association) in July 1970 in a corner of Prospect Park's Wollman Rink. Here the show was presented at Meg Webster's Stonefield, a sculpture installation of boulders selected for their special shapes and unusual sculptural qualities.
Some of the boulders are very colorful, some are concave, some craggy, one is very tall, another shaped somewhat like a boat, all are arranged to show their unique characteristics and individuality. Most of the audience sat on some of the large stones as the cast enacted the familiar story -- probably the classic summer outdoor Shakespeare show, which we've seen about eight times in various parks already -- around them.
We were close to the dreamy-at-dusk Hudson River, and sunset and the surroundings made the magic and theme of Midsummer Night's Dream come alive in a different way than we'd ever seen the play done before.
In addition to being intimate, the Beautiful Soup's Dream also moved quickly. At about 75 minutes, they'd obviously cut out decent chunks of Shakespeare's text, but we couldn't tell, despite what is (or should be) our familiarity with the text.
The cast is uniformly excellent, and the only difficulties we had were the times, not often, when a cast member was simply too far away from the boulder where we sat for the sound to carry clearly amid all the noise of the pier and Twelfth Avenue.
We'd seen other nontraditional gender casting in the past, as in the Pulse Ensemble's having Oberon and Titania as two powerful gay men earlier this summer, but we'd never seen Bottom played by a woman before watching Anne Richmond's very funny turn as the weaver-turned-donkey.
Aside from the slapstick, her befuddlement and naivete exude a sweetness, both in her rehearsals for and performances in the mechanicals' play within a play and Bottoms' scenes with the lovestruck Titania (a flighty, passionate Rebecca De Ornelas).
Isaiah Tanenbaum played a nicely hippie-ish droll Puck in a dungaree jacket over an I ♥ NEW YORK t-shirt (if we're talking Woodstock 1969, that mid-70s symbol's actually an anachronism),
and the four young lovers all had great comic timing and lots of passion, the two qualities they need most. Emily Floyd plays Helena as a young woman so used to being overlooked that she's most hilarious in her consternation at suddenly being the love object of two guys. Patrick Shane's Lysander is charismatic and edgily dynamic although the character is a bit more Grease than Hair).
Hermia (Mallory Berlin) is a bit haughty and humorously contrary, as when she can turn on a dime from expressing her extreme sexual longing for Lysander to practically ordering him to "to lie yet further off" when the runaway couple first sleep in the woods. As Demetrius, Jordan Tierney is winningly nerdy, petulant, and the kind of pain in the neck guy you end up liking; he's a good foil for the other three young people.
The working class actors who perform the unintentionally laughable melodrama Pyramus and Thisbe to celebrate the multiple weddings at Dream's end are, in addition to Bottom, a colorful bunch of burnouts and freaks. Led by the most staid of the bunch, Peter Quince (Charles Baker, who exuded shabby dignity in last year's Hudson Warehouse production of Taming of the Shrew, the amateur thespians include David Marx as Tom Snout, appropriately blockheaded as he plays a wall; an adorably shy but game Salvatore Casto as a Snug the Joiner managing to eke out his roars as the play's supposedly fearsome lion;
Leslie Crincoli as the flustered good trouper Robin Starveling, holding her lantern to be the moonshine; and the winning Dom Crincoli, who moves from his female impersonation as Francis Flute playing Thisbe to strap on his guitar and serve as the play's balladeer.
We actually didn't realize until we saw the credits that Samantha Mercado-Tudda and Dennis Del Bene who exuded such dignity and sophistication as the regal Hippolyte and Theseus were the same actors playing the flighty (literally) fairies Mustardseed and Cobweb.
Dennis Del Bene, in his no-nonsense business suit, played Egeus as a petty tyrant who's smart enough to know when to bend. And we liked Frank Ugochukwu's thoughtful and sexy interpretation of Oberon, king of the fairies, both matched his queen Titania's less cerebral and more impulsive passions but who managed to step back, and along with Puck, seemed to join the audience -- an enthusiastic group who just about fit in the "theater" of the Stonefield space (though clearly some enchanted passersby on foot and bike stop and stood on the periphery to stay to the end).
Director Steven Carl McCasland, artistic director of the Beautiful Soup Theater Collective, managed to create an economical, warm Midsummer Night's Dream whose virtues were evident on the first night of performances. The next show is on Thursday at 7 p.m., and then at the same time on Tuesday, August 21; Thursday, August 23; Friday, August 24; and finally, on Saturday August 25 at both 1 p.m. and 7 p.m.
As the troupe's website notes,
Exploring classics and re-visiting musicals that never reached their pinnacle, The Soup chooses a charitable organization whose mission matches the themes of the show at end. The profits made at the box office, along with donations collected by actors after each performance, are donated to that charity. With four to five shows a year, The Beautiful Soup Theater Collective continues to be an active force in community growth.
Tonight we went to Coney Island for the inaugural event in the Seaside Summer Concert Series at Asser Levy/Seaside Park and went back in time to when we turned 18 in the summer of '69. We joined thousands of the borough's other ex-rockers and alter kockers for Brooklyn's Salute to the fortieth anniversary of Woodstock, with Creedence Clearwater Revisited, John Sebastian, and Mountain featuring Leslie West and Corky Lang. Our friends Linda and Howie drove up to go to Woodstock with some pals, but if we remember correctly, they were freaked out by the traffic on the Quickway and so appalled by the mud and lack of bathrooms, they left after the first day. In the fall of 1969, we were in group therapy sessions run by our psychiatrist, Dr. Abbott Lippman, on Albemarle Road off Coney Island Avenue. John, one of the kids in the group had been to Woodstock, and whenever there were long silences in group therapy or someone said something Dr. Lippman thought was irrelevant or self-deluding, he'd turn to John and say, "So, John, was there much mud at Woodstock?" "So was there was much mud at Woodstock?" became one of our catch phrases when we were bored with the conversation. We didn't get off the F train till about 7:45 p.m. although the concert was scheduled for 7:30 p.m. Not only is this summer the 40th anniversary of Woodstock, it's also the 40th anniversary of us meeting Borough President Marty Markowitz, when he was the president only of the evening student government at Brooklyn College and we were an entering day freshman. But we know that Marty can talk for a long time. Once we got off at West 8th Street, we followed the crowds, and a grandma taking kids home from day camp at the Shorefront Y, down Seabreeze Avenue to Asser Levy/Seaside Park. The first person we encountered was an anti-Marty petitioner who said that if the borough president's plan to replace the current bandshell with an $64 million amphitheater happens, these free concerts will cost $40. "Save our neighborhood park," she said. We signed. We passed the card players and the chess players and the VIP entrance and the disabled entrance and made our way to where people could pay $5 for a seat at a folding chair. Other folks brought their own chairs from home. It was a long line. Onstage, someone was trying to do for "God Bless America" what Jimi did for "The Star-Spangled Banner." While we were waiting, and Marty was introducing various city council members and others, people handed us leaflets, like for mayoral candidate Controller Bill Thompson. These kids were passing out leaflets for Councilman John Liu, running for Thompson's job. A flyer for a show called The Boychick Affair told you everything about the makeup of this crowd. These are the people we grew up, our landsmen from southern Brooklyn.
A Lubavitcher who looked old enough to have been at Woodstock asked us, "Are you Joosh?"
"Certainly not," we replied, following the example of our Brooklyn College friend Lenny Tropp when confronted with the Mitzvahmobile on Hillel Place in the early '70s. There was nary a hipster in sight. At 58, we were probably close to the median age of the huge crowd. It's weird to hear old Jewish ladies saying things like "Oy, that Jethro Tull concert in '70 was so great!" There were some who looked like they never left the hippie era. We're glad to have cut off our once-shoulder-length hair and ditched our headband, love beads and macrame belt. We found a seat far back from the stage, which we could see through other people's heads. We sat through a rendition of our beloved borough's official theme, "Every Day's a Holiday in Brooklyn." El Día de los Muertos came to mind. The crowds really cheered when Marty stopped introducing people and John Sebastian took the stage. We were to a John Sebastian show at Brooklyn College's Whitman Auditorium back in the early 1970s when he looked like this: It was nostalgic to hear songs like "Do You Believe in Magic" and "Summer in the City" again, but John's voice is a lot raspier now. According to Wikipedia, here's his Woodstock cred:
He had a memorable, albeit unscheduled appearance at Woodstock, appearing after Country Joe McDonald's set, playing songs such as "I Had A Dream," "Rainbows All Over Your Blues" and "Younger Generation" which he dedicated to a newborn baby at the festival. Documentary remarks by festival organizers revealed that Sebastian was under the influence at the time, hence his spontaneity and casual, unplanned set.
"He's talking his songs now," an old man behind us said. His companions said Sebastian was doing a lot better than some other singers from forty years ago whose recent concerts they'd attended. ("Whaddaya talking about, do you remember how bad Linda Ronstadt stunk in Long Island?") There was a lot of music kibitzing. We enjoyed his set. Dragonscrew714 posted this video of John singing "Darling Be Home Soon":
John said he loved Brooklyn - of course - but grew up "on the other side of the bridge," in Greenwich Village. He told a nice story about his father, John Benson Sr., a noted classical harmonica player, and how he, young John, decided to "quit the harmonica" at age five. But he closed with a very good harmonica solo. He also did his Brooklynesque hit, the classic title song of the TV show Welcome Back, Kotter. A friend played it for us when we moved back to Brooklyn after decades away. The sweathogs in the audience enjoyed the nostalgia. It was great to see John Sebastian for us, and it did bring back great early-teen memories of The Lovin' Spoonful as well as echoes from John's musical roots in the blues and folk. And even if they were croaked, "Did You Ever (Have to Make up Your Mind)" and "Mobileline" would sound good to at least one old fart sitting in his distant seat. (Maybe because our ears ain't so good anymore?) For us, the highlight of the evening was the set by Mountain, featuring Corky Laing and the amazing Leslie West. Our brother was a big Cream fan, so when Felix Pappalardi joined Leslie West and the others in Mountain, we heard their albums coming from the next room dozens of times. According to Wikipedia,
[Mountain] played their fourth live concert at the 1969 Woodstock Festival in Bethel, New York (later chronicling the experience in their song "For Yasgur's Farm"), but the band did not appear in the film of the event nor was their performance included on volume 1 of the festival's live album. It was however included on the second volume.
The crowd really seemed to love Mountain. By then it was dark, and we thought we'd walk around and catch people's reactions to seeing renditions of classics like "Mississippi Queen" and "Nantucket Sleighride." At Surf Avenue, people were rocking out. This dog got his music and water too. Leslie is a Brooklynite, from East 19th Street and Albemarle Road, though he later moved out to Long Island. His mom changed their name from Weinstein. He said that when he made it with Mountain, he splurged on a Bentley and took all his relatives from the old neighborhood to Nathan's in Coney Island, making the mistake of letting them eat hot dogs with mustard and french fries with ketchup in the back seat. He was amazing on guitar, and Corky's pretty amazing too, as was the rest of the band. Mountain will be in Bethel to celebrate the 40th anniversary of Woodstock in a month, and at the end of the band's set, Leslie West is planning to get married to his fiancee Jenni Maurer onstage. We absolutely adored his long rendition of "Blowin' in the Wind," which Leslie said sounded to him as if Bob Dylan had written it just last weekend.
During the next break, after the audience gave Mountain a grateful sendoff, we made our way to the first row of non-VIP seats, though way over on the right side of the stage. Marty had taken off his signature white sport jacket and underneath was a multi-hued pseudopsychedelic T-shirt with a peace sign. On our 20th birthday in June 1971, we went with our girlfriend to Macy's in Kings Plaza and bought ourselves a gold peace sign we wore around our neck for years. We don't know what happened to that chain, but this old duffer had a peace sign on the back of his jean jacket. On the ground, we found a crumpled-up leaflet protesting the amphitheater plan. Creedence Clearwater Revival's performance at Woodstock is the stuff of legend. Tim K wrote on the Woodstock website:
Never forget when Creedence came on. They hit the opening riff and, because of Top 40 radio, everyone recognized that twang of John Fogerty's guitar. The crowd (and I mean the entire crowd) rose to their feet as one and cheered.
How incredible was that? Yet the very litigious John Fogerty never wanted that video shown because he was unhappy with the sound. We were glad to see Creedence Clearwater Revisited, but as a gray-haired guy with a John Lennon T-shirt who said he was "getting too old for concerts" whom we met at the Ocean Parkway el station as 11 p.m. approached, told us: "They're now basically a CCR cover band. . . like the Beatles would be without John Lennon or The Doors without Jim Morrison." That said, Stu Cook and Doug Clifford are still first-rate musicians. And their songs, well... How can you go wrong with "Suzie Q"? Or "Who'll Stop the Rain"? Or "Born on the Bayou"? Or "Bad Moon Rising"? Man, those songs are the soundtrack to years of our lives. . . Anyone above a certain age will feel something when they listen to CCRevisited sing "Proud Mary." It would be weird if we didn't. Tonight Coney Island went back to a glorious time 40 years ago. But in two days Coney Island will host the Siren Festival. There'll always be glorious times, so while nostalgia is always fun, well, we got home after midnight and that's later than it used to be for some of us.
