Bruce Dow as Dromio of Syracuse and David Snelgrove as Antipholus of Syracuse photo by David Hou

Last laugh falls flat

And so Richard Monette has chosen to close out his bawdy of work with what is likely the Bard’s first tome and, too sadly, the Stratford Festival’s retiring artistic director’s last.  We say sadly as Shakespeare’s droll wit and spot-on sense of the ludicrous is trumped at every turn by pointless pratfalls, teasing tassels, self-serving commercials (on an artistic par with the very wayward cellphones and beepers that we’re chided to silence in Greek) and a larger-than-life, unscripted penguin whose back-of-head placard reads “Just for the critics.”  Er, thanks!

Methinks he doth protest too much.

Despite a heroic effort by the company to accede to their leader’s wishes and send him off in fine style, the gags are so over-done in this “Get ye to a funnery” that, Measure for Measure, there are no redeeming qualities (very nearly in the same dreadful category as Mel Gibson and Gaspard Noé—cross-references below).

For his last Shakespearean hurrah, Monette seems determined to clean out his Tickle Trunk and mask the play’s considerable humour with sight guffaws that were briefly in vogue when Rowan & Martin’s Laugh-In and Monty Python’s Flying Circus were on first-run telly.

More’s the pity.

Self-indulgence-on-the-Avon is easily boiled down to a quartet of syllables:  Pharce goes to camp.

Go for the yuks, but leave your artistic sensibilities in the foyer.

Exeunt.

Director	Richard Monette
Cast	Walter Borden, Ian Deaken, Bruce Dow, Paul Essiembre, Edouard Fontaine, Allegra Fulton, Lawrence Haegert, Eli Ham, Jean-Michel Le Gal, Roy Lewis, Tom McCamus, Chick Reid, Steve Ross, David Snelgrove, Brian Tree, Sophia Walker, Brigit Wilson
Composer	Keith Thomas
Set Designer	Michael Gianfrancesco
Fight Director	John Stead
Choreographer	Lawrence Haegert
Commedia Master Teacher	Perry Schneiderman
Costume Designer	Dana Osborne
Sound Designer	Keith Handegord
Lighting Designer	Kevin Fraser

Cross references: The Passion of the Christ, Irreversible

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