Press Release

Great Lakes Theater Festival Presents A Powerful Pair of Classics This Fall In Rotating Repertory

September 1, 2005
GLTF’s resident company of actors performs both Amadeus and As You Like It on the same stage for six weeks to launch second half of Festival’s 44 th season.

CLEVELAND, OH – Great Lakes Theater Festival (GLTF) commences the second half of its 2005 season with a Fall Repertory that features Peter Shaffer’s Tony Award-winning thriller Amadeus and William Shakespeare’s classic romantic comedy As You Like It. The productions will be performed in rotating repertory at the Ohio Theatre, Playhouse Square Center, September 16 – October 22, 2005. The Fall Repertory event features a single company of twenty-one actors performing two alternating plays on the same stage over six weeks. Gordon Reinhart will direct Amadeus and Risa Brainin will direct As You Like It.

Great Lakes Theater Festival’s production of Amadeus is presented with generous support from Moen, Inc. and As You Like It is sponsored by The Great Lakes Theater Festival Business Alliance (members include Jo-Ann Stores, Inc. and Fifth Third Bank). Media sponsors for the Festival’s 2005 season are Cleveland.com, Cleveland Free Times, WCLV 104.9 and WCPN 90.3 ideastream. Great Lakes Theater Festival’s 2005 season is dedicated to the memory of James O. Roberts (GLTF Trustee 1984-2005).

“We couldn’t have asked for a better start to our 2005 season,” said GLTF Producing Artistic Director, Charles Fee, at the midpoint of the Festival’s 44 th year. “It’s an exciting time to be at Great Lakes. The renaissance of this company is really beginning to build momentum. Our season ticket attendance is up more than 25% over last season, our company of artists continues to produce theater of the absolute highest caliber and the response from our audience to our work and to the concept of producing theater in rotating repertory has been overwhelmingly positive. Looking forward to the two amazing pieces of theater that make up our Fall Repertory, I couldn’t be more thrilled. There are big things on the horizon for Great Lakes Theater Festival and this season is just the beginning.”

The Festival’s Fall Repertory opens with Amadeus starring Cleveland favorite Andrew May in the role of Salieri. Set in the opulent splendor of 18th century Vienna, Peter Shaffer’s thrilling and wickedly funny Tony Award-winning drama pits blazing human ambition against heavenly genius. Antonio Salieri is exalted as the most famous composer in a city of musicians, until the young Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart arrives. Brutally confronted with the limitations of his own talent and believing God to have abandoned him, Salieri embarks on a desperate course of action. Making his artistic debut with the Festival, Gordon Reinhart will direct the production.

“I think one of the things that’s so exciting about this play for audiences is that it offers a rare opportunity to catch a glimpse of Mozart the human being,” said Reinhart in a recent interview. “Certainly the world of the play is the world of Mozart’s music. But to see this unbelievably famous artist walk and breathe and live and talk…alive…right on the stage before you is exhilarating. And Peter Shaffer has created a brilliant window into the life of his title character. What is particularly interesting to me in Amadeus is that Shaffer really takes a stab at what Mozart might have created from. Often, we divorce an artist from their work. The work lives on and the name may live on…but we really don’t have a sense of the human being or the life experiences that collided to shape their work. Shaffer reintroduces the human element to the equation with deft strokes. But Amadeus is not a documentary. It is a story…the oldest type of theater. I think that is another element that makes this play so rewarding…it is someone telling us a great story. And through the fascinating lens of our narrator, Salieri, we experience a haunting, larger than life telling of it. With Andrew May at the helm of this production as Salieri, I think we are in for a real treat. He is an extraordinary actor. This role is in many ways the modern Hamlet. It’s very rewarding to witness an artist of Andrew’s caliber confront a great role like Salieri head on. I think audiences are going to be thrilled with his performance.”

William Shakespeare’s classic comedy As You Like It completes the Festival’s Fall Repertory pairing. Comic twists and turns abound in the uncharted territory of the Forest of Arden, where Rosalind seeks refuge after being wrongfully banished by her uncle. Her unfortunate exile is transformed into a charming adventure when she encounters some of Shakespeare’s most beloved characters - colorful fools, witty rustics, and the handsome, love struck Orlando. A wondrous mating dance ensues that transforms the lost into lovers and replaces the tyranny of the town with the peace of the country. Risa Brainin returns to the Festival to direct As You Like It after staging last season’s critically acclaimed production of Julius Caesar at GLTF.

“What strikes me most about As You Like It is its clear depiction of how we can get stuck in our ways, how we cling to order, to rules, to ways of thinking that seem to give us some comfort when we feel threatened. And how it takes a monumental change in environment to break us away from our comfort zone, and cause us to have a paradigm shift,” said Brainin of her production, which is set in a 1930s milieu and takes its visual cues from the disparate artistic stylings of Tadao Ando’s architecture and Maxfield Parrish’s landscapes. She continued, “In Arden, there are no rules whatsoever. A girl can be a boy. A cynic can become an optimist, a city person can fall in love with a country person, and a Republican can even converse with a Democrat! There is no sense of time. There are no hard and fast rules. We are in such an interesting moment in history where all of our notions of right and wrong, order and chaos are being questioned. As the world becomes smaller, the old systems that used to define the world are becoming obsolete. The concept of hierarchy is literally falling down, and nature is the best informant of what is most important. Wonderful transformation can occur when we are released from the regular, day to day, cyclical, and sometimes rigid routines of our ordered lives. As You Like It invites us to revel in that release!”

GLTF’s Fall Repertory features a single company of twenty-one actors performing roles in both plays. Fourteen members of the acting company are Cleveland-based actors. “Top to bottom, this is an absolutely outstanding classical company of actors. To a person, this cast is experienced, skilled and very, very talented,” said Charles Fee of his repertory ensemble. “We are especially proud to have such a large number of Cleveland actors in our company this season. I think it clearly demonstrates the Festival’s commitment to the local acting community as well as to the economic development of the city of Cleveland.”

“This is an exciting time for Great Lakes Theater Festival,” continued Fee regarding Cleveland’s classic theater. “Of all the changes that we have made over the past several seasons, what is most rewarding to me is to have been able to renew our commitment as an organization to the idea of company. On an artistic level, on an administrative level and in our work throughout this vibrant community, the idea of company has and will continue to yield great results for the Festival. I look forward to kicking off the second half of our season with this pair of classic plays and I can’t wait to share them with Cleveland.”

Opening Night performances of Amadeus (September 17 th) and As You Like It (October 1 st) have been scheduled for Saturday evenings with preview performances of both productions scheduled for Friday nights. Curtain times for all evening performances will remain at 7:30 p.m., with a 1:30 p.m. curtain time for Saturday matinees and a 3:00 p.m. curtain time for Sunday matinees. Both productions in GLTF’s Fall Repertory will continue to offer sign interpreted and audio described performances as well as the popular Director’s Night and Playnotes pre-show discussion series. (Consult the enclosed season performance calendars for complete details.)

Single tickets for Great Lakes Theater Festival productions range in price from $21.50-$55.00 (Student tickets $12.50 – any performance / any seat) and are available by calling (216) 241-6000, by ordering online, by visiting the Playhouse Square Center Box office or any Tickets.com outlet located within all Tops Friendly Markets. Groups of ten or more receive discounts as do educators and students. (Consult the enclosed information sheet for complete ticketing and contact details.)

Since 1962, Great Lakes Theater Festival has brought the pleasure, power and relevance of classic theater to the widest possible audience in Northern Ohio. The first resident company of Playhouse Square Center, Great Lakes Theater Festival has called the Ohio Theatre home since 1982.

About the Directors

Gordon Reinhart
Director, Amadeus

Gordon started his directing career at the Attic Theater in Detroit with productions of Hamlet, The Merchant of Venice and Beehive. He staged A Chorus Line for Riverside Theatre in Florida. He was Artistic Director of the Snowmass/Aspen Repertory Theater where he directed The Cherry Orchard, A…My Name is Alice, Speed the Plow and the American premiere of Lucy’s Play. He staged The Misanthrope and the West Coast premiere of The Whole Shebang at L.A.’s Theatre 40. His Chicago productions included Sleuth at the Court Theater, Much Ado About Nothing and Love’s Labors Lost for the Yugen Theater, Conversations With and Irish Rascal at the Northlight Theater. Gordon is currently the head of the Directing and Acting Program at Boise State University where he has directed The Winter’s Tale, The Visit,Twelfth Night, Present Laughter and Tartuffe. Other Idaho credits include The Taming of the Shrew, for Idaho Repertory Theatre, and Amadeus and Twelfth Night for Idaho Shakespeare Festival. Upcoming projects include, Julius Caesar for Detroit’s Hilberry Repertory Theatre, Measure for Measure at Boise State University and The Memory of Water for the Boise Contemporary Theatre. Gordon received a BA in Music from Depauw University, an MFA in Acting from West Virginia and did post-graduate work in Directing at Wayne State University.

Risa Brainin
Director, As You Like It

Risa Brainin returns to GLTF where she directed Julius Caesar in 2004. She served as Artistic Director of Shakespeare Santa Cruz (2001-03) where she directed The Sea Gull, Hamlet and The Emperor’s New Clothes. Prior to SSC, she held the position of Associate Artistic Director for Missouri Repertory (2000-2002), and Indiana Repertory Theatre (1997-2000.) From 1987-1997, she resided in Minneapolis and had a rich association with the Guthrie Theater, serving as Resident Director (1991-93), Associate Company Director (1995-96) and Acting Instructor in the company’s outreach program (1987-97.) Brainin’s directorial credits include: The Merchant of Venice, “Short Plays”: Tone Clusters, Naomi in the Living Room and Zoo Story, A Christmas Carol, and Mystery of the Rose Bouquet at the Guthrie Theater; To Kill a Mockingbird, The Herbal Bed, Macbeth, One Thousand Cranes, Talley’s Folly, Blithe Spirit, Noises Off and Pygmalion at Indiana Rep; Machinal, Morning Star and Indian Ink at Missouri Rep; The Comedy of Errors at Alabama Shakespeare Festival; Uncle Vanya and The Government Inspector at American Players Theatre, Lots of Love Gertrude, Ever Thine Thornton and Greater Tuna at the Actors’ Theatre of Louisville, As You Like It at the Shakespeare Festival of St. Louis, The Underpants at Milwaukee Rep, and Julius Caesar and King Lear at Idaho Shakespeare Festival. The former director of education for SteppingStone Theatre for Youth Development, Brainin’s Minneapolis / St. Paul directing credits include work at the Great American History Theatre, Mixed Blood Theatre, Illusion Theatre, and the Cricket Theatre. A graduate of the Carnegie-Mellon University Drama Program, Ms. Brainin teaches at the University of California, Santa Barbara.

At A Glance

* Member of Actors’ Equity Association, the Union of Professional Actors and Stage Managers in the United States.

Reviews: As You Like It

Plain Dealer
Tuesday, October 4, 2005
Well, it’s certainly as we like it
Carolyn Jack, Plain Dealer Arts Reporter

Risa Brainin has gone to extremes.

Not just one or two, but many, as if she were a pinball ricocheting from point to opposite point in a big arcade game of her own making.

The Great Lakes Theater Festival production she has directed of Shakespeare’s “As You Like It,” which opened last weekend, caroms from a prison world of harsh concrete to a watercolor woodland paradise; from Noel Coward-era sophisticates in silk dressing gowns to hayseeds straight out of “Hee Haw”; from Edwardian female froufrou and nightclub chorus boys to cartoon hip-hop.

Pretty soon, all of it seems simultaneous, with people sporting clothing and attitudes from bizarrely unrelated historical periods and wandering around loose or corralled together like the time travelers from “Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure.”

Bogus? Heck, no. It works. And it’s anybody’s guess why, so here’s one: Each individual actor’s performance is so delightful, true and/or hilarious that you just want to hang around, enjoying the company and helplessly waiting to see what fresh silliness will come next.

There’s plenty in this story of two evil lords: one, a duke who usurps his brother and banishes his niece, Rosalind; the other, who takes out a contract on his younger sibling, Orlando, forcing him to flee. The exiles find their way into the forest, where they discover freedom, the enchantment of love and apparently, really good martinis.

Brainin, who directed Great Lakes’ superlative “Julius Caesar” last season, has assembled outstanding resident talent for “As You Like It,” including Scott Plate, Marc Moritz, Nina Dom ingue, George Roth, Nicholas Koesters and Dudley Swetland. They provide some of the production’s best character work, from Plate’s I-feel-a-song-coming-on crooner and Moritz’s stand-up comic of a Touchstone to the expertly nuanced courtiers, servants and yokels played by the other four.

Brainin has chosen her leads well, too – actors of quicksilver versatility and great warmth, qualities that keep you happily hanging on while they swoop and rattle between emotions and styles.

As Rosalind and Orlando, Julie Evan Smith and Jeff Cribbs give the show its heart with performances that radiate deep caring and giddy fun.

But the production’s most impeccably deadpan piece of comedy comes from Dougfred Miller as Jaques, a favorite of the banished duke who doesn’t even try to adjust to rural life, but cleaves with despondent hauteur to his cocktail glass, cigarette holder and deck chair.

Cole Porter meets Opryland? In this “As You Like It,” anything goes.

Tuesday, October 4, 2005
A Will and a Wisp: A transcendent As You Like It at Great Lakes
James Damico

Sometimes it seems Great Lakes Theater Festival’s main concern these days is to make sure its classic revivals bear a hip and promotable contemporary stamp. This fixation has led to more than one “bright idea” for updating a production – as with this year’s sit-compromised The Merry Wives of Windsor – emerging as merely belligerently and bewilderingly dumb. Thank the theatrical gods, however, that Risa Brainin has apparently self-prescribed enough directorial Prozac to largely tranquilize the GLTF obsession-compulsion, and discover more laid-back, reasonable and occasionally delightful modern correspondences in Shakespeare’s As You Like It.

In this 1598 comedy, Willie is wonking about love, as it variously transports and derails a quartet of odd couples. At the court of nasty Frederick, who usurped the realm from his good brother, the latter’s daughter Rosalind goes gaga over disinherited orphan Orlando while watching him muscle it out with Frederick’s champion wrestler. Subsequently, under a death threat from her uncle – along with loyal cousin Celia, faithful court clown Touchstone, and, separately, the homeless Orlando – she repairs in male disguise to the enchanted Forest of Arden, where her father has already found refuge with a Robin-Hood-ish band of followers.

Once in the magical wood, the Bard gets down to his real business of orchestrating then disarranging, entangling then delaying, the inevitable amorous hookups – a process made indelibly affecting by the poet’s transcendent verse. There’s rustic rube Silvius pining for milkmaid Phebe, who has fallen pail over tail for Rosalind in her mildly macho masquerade, and who will eventually welcome the rough consolation of Silvius’ genuine article. Wily, wisecracking Touchstone thinks he’s found a gullible haymate in Audrey, a seemingly simple country lass; but her native shrewdness and his fluctuating emotions deliver instead a romantic haymaker. For Celia, it’s passion at first peek at the mutually stricken Oliver, Orlando’s once-evil brother, who has stumbled into the wood and, by way of a near-death experience, has been transformed into a real great guy.

The central matchup, however, is Orlando with the enravishing Rosalind, a part all the great actresses of centuries past have committed mayhem, murder and marriage to secure. The couple are not yet the battling lovers of Willie’s next opus, Much Ado About Nothing; but they do spar around a lot on the subject of love, energized by the author’s most inventive use of his favored girl-in-boy’s-camouflage device. Having ingratiated herself with the clueless Orlando as his buddy, our heroine gets him to practice his wooing by pretending that he/she is his beloved Rosalind and testing his pitch on him/her. This leads to a gaggle of amusing and endearing ironies, and finally to full loving disclosure.

Happily, GLTF anchors its production in this seriously playful kidding by getting it precisely right. In her Carole Lombard pantsuit and Mary Quant cap (a highlight among costumes that tend to be all over the place), Julie Evan Smith is an embraceably aggressive, fitfully vulnerable screwball-comedy sweetheart. Though occasionally overindulging her mannerisms, she makes both the faux boyishness and the real feminine wit most attractive. Not exactly boyish or hunky, and unashamedly balding, Jeff Cribbs has surprisingly become the company’s juvenile. As in past similar assignments, his Orlando is amiable, clear-spoken, low-key, fully competent, yet stubbornly unprepossessing. More important, though, he matches up compatibly with Smith.

The second of the evening’s strengths – in contradistinction to many previous GLTF efforts – is its collection of colorful, artfully distinguished characters. Among many such, the constantly improving Kathryn Cherasaro creates the perfect warm and sassy girlfriend in Celia. Untraditionally but winningly, Marc Moritz turns Touchstone into a Borscht Belt emcee, with borrowings from Jimmy Durante and Jackie Mason; Jerry Vogel transitions distinctively from good to evil as both Dukes; Paul Kiernan converts most believably into the marriageable Oliver; and Derdriu Ring utterly convinces as a hayseed harridan.

The Arden setting is a little short on magic, but the mounting’s one decided misstep is its desperately trite representation of Frederick’s duchy as a fascist dictatorship, encased in massive concrete-block walls that make the court more like a prison courtyard. Luckily, though, it isn’t too long before the prisoners – and the production – make a welcome breakout.

Cool Cleveland
Wednesday, October 5, 2005
As You Like It @ Ohio Theatre
Kelly Ferjutz

Set in the 1930s, Shakespeare’s comedy As You Like It isn’t very funny at the beginning, but soon moves away from the concrete, black-and-white starkness of the city into the lush, sherbet shades of the countrside, where comedy seems to grow amongst the trees and meadows of the Forest of Arden. But cross-dressing, mistaken identity, loyalty and treason also flourish in this environment.

When Duke Senior is unjustly banished from the court of his younger brother, Duke Frederick, two young women are also affected. Senior’s daughter Rosalind and her cousin Celia, leave in company with the court clown Touchstone. Precipitating this latter event are the actions of another set of brothers, Oliver (the bad) and Orlando (the good). Rosalind has fallen in love with Orlando at first sight, but when Orlando’s life is threatened he leaves the court as well. She disguises herself as a young man (Ganymede) to make good her escape, protect Celia, and learn more about Orlando.

Of course, being Shakespeare there are always multitudes of other characters in secondary (and even third-ary?) plots, but director Raisa Brainin keeps the pace at a brisk level, amply aided by the ever-present clowns, at which Shakespeare excelled. Scenic Designer Chris Pickart’s stark castle easily turns into the forest, with the help of a sliding panel or two. Enhancement also comes by way of the lighting, designed by Michel Klaers. Costumes by Devon Painter echo the stark/colorful image of the setting; black and white for the opening scene and luscious brights and pastels afterward. An interesting touch is the pastel borders on the formerly all white dresses, trousers and jackets.

Shakespeare’s plays also seem to require music more often than those of other playwrights. Brad Carroll does a super job for this production, with appropriate background music interspersed with sprightly tunes appropriate for the changing scenes. Trust me, you haven’t lived until you’ve seen and heard the five lords attending Duke Senior in a hip-hop version of ‘Hey, Nonny, Nonny!’. Honest! Fortunately for everyone concerned, Scott Plate is one of those lords, and he’s delightful when he bursts into song at all sorts of unexpected moments.

The cast was a bit uneven in places, but this may be because of the pressure of the ‘rep’-type season; most likely, they’ll settle in soon. Jeff Cribbs is not only handsome but also a very athletic Orlando, doing flips and cartwheels in his joyful young-love mode. His Rosalind, Julie Evan Smith, was bright and pretty, but not very convincing as a boy. To be sure, she handled her two big speeches with aplomb; the “From the East to Western Ind” and the epilog.

Kathryn Cherasaro was spunky and perky as Celia, aiding and abetting her cousin’s disguise, while traveling through ‘foreign lands’. The Touchstone of Marc Moritz was a delight, as was his costume of form-fitting black and loose, billowy white, a multicolored all-in-one suit! Dougfred Miller as Jacques had the fun of extolling the ‘seven ages of man’ while Jerry Vogel played both Dukes.

Derdriu Ring was the love-lorn Phebe, gawky and persistent in her love of Ganymede, while ignoring the wonderfully rustic Silvius of Nick Koesters. Boogey-ing up a storm, as usual, Nina Domingue was her usual sassy self as Audrey.

As You Like It plays in rep through October 22 with Amadeus. For tickets to either of these productions order online or call (216) 241-6000.

The Times Newspapers
‘As You Like It’ delights at GLTF
Roy Berko, Member, American Theatre Critics Association

When you go to see ‘As You Like It,’ now on stage at the Great Lakes Theatre Festival you would be well served to just forget it was written by William Shakespeare. Being open-minded will allow you to fully enjoy director Risa Brainin’s production without being upset that it doesn’t use Shakespearean traditional staging or stick with fidelity to the Bard’s language. Just accept Brainin’s creativity in molding a fine cast into a fun production.

‘As You Like It,’ written about 1598, is one of Shakespeare’s most-often produced romantic comedies. It was written just before he moved on to his major tragedies. It is not an original concept as it is based on Thomas Lodge’s ‘Rosalynde.’

The play follows a pastoral tradition of writing in which a story involves exiles from the court going into the countryside. While in the rural area, they held singing contests and philosophically discussed the various merits of various lifestyles. Shakespeare used the same concept in ‘A Midsummer Night’s Dream.’ The singing aspect allows for a nuance not often seen in many other Shakespeare productions. In the GLTF production, to add to the traditional songs, original music was written by Brad Carroll. It is creatively slipped into the show with a do-op quintet with lead singer Scott Plate doing not only fine singing, but creating a delightful portrayal that harks back to the style of 30’s musical films.

The story begins with the ousting of the Duke, father of Rosalind, from the throne by his own brother. With some loyal servants, he hides in the Forest of Arden, while back in the court Rosalind falls in love with the orphan Orlando and is subsequently also expelled. Rosalind disguises herself as a man, a common Shakespearean device. (‘Twelfth Night’ for example has gender-bending antics.) She escapes the court and brings along her friend Celia and Touchstone, the court jester. As always in Shakespeare’s comedies, following unmasking and resolution, the couples sort themselves out appropriately and all is well that ends well.

As is the case in other Shakespearean comedies, the audience must realize that the situations are not real and therefore, observe with a suspension of belief. For example, though we may want to question it on a reality level, in order for the play to work we have to believe that Duke Senior does not recognize his own daughter in disguise and accept that Rosalind’s masquerade as a man goes undetected until the play’s happy ending.

The GLTF’s production is just plain out-and-out fun. Brainin mixes costume, language, musical and staging styles. Though traditionalists may quack, the melange of styles works well. Scenic Designer Chris Pickart’s sets work well. Devon Painter has a great time blending sado-masochistic leather outfits with modern garb and sixteenth century clothing. Janiece Kelley-Kiteley’s choreography is extremely creative and well executed.

The performances are excellent. Julie Evan Smith as Rosalind, and Kathryn Cherasaro as Celia, are delightful. They play off each other well and create a charming pair of young court-mannered ladies. Jeff Cribbs is properly earnest and love struck as Orlando, though his slight physical build doesn’t translate well into his being able to grapple and beat the bulky Gilgamesh Taggett, the court wrestler. But, as with much of this show, it works if you suspend your logical beliefs. Chunky Paul Kiernan, as Orlando’s mean brother who turns nice guy, and Taggett (double cast as Orlando’s other brother) don’t physically look like they belong in the same family with the slender Cribbs, but, again, suspend belief and their acting carries them to acceptability.

Marc Moritz is delightful as Touchstone, the court clown. His black and white split down-the-middle costume adds to his nuanced performance. Nina Dominque is hysterical as his love interest who spends much of the play being carted around the stage in a wheelbarrow, with her legs symbolically spread apart.

Dougfred Miller almost steals the show as Jaques, the melancholy doomsayer who recites the “All of the world’s a stage…” soliloquy, one of the Bard’s most famous speeches. After his initial song, each time Scott Plate strikes the melodramatic pose that indicates he is about to sing, the audience howled with delight. Derdriu Ring (Phebe) and Nicholas Koesters as her suitor (Silvius) also are wonderful.

Capsule Judgement
GLTF’s ‘As You Like It’ is a delightful production. Go with an open mind. Remember, this is not traditional Shakespeare, stay open to what it is and you’ll have a fine time.

‘As You Like It’ and ‘Amadeus’ are running in tandem through October 22. For tickets to any GLTF production call 216-241-6000 or 800-766-6048 or order online.

Educators: GLTF has prepared an excellent Teacher Preparation Guide for aiding students to understand and enjoy ‘As You Like It.’ Contact GLTF to obtain your copy.

Reviews: Amadeus

Cleveland Scene
Wednesday, September 21, 2005
Note Perfect: Dueling composers yield a delightful show in Great Lakes’ Amadeus.
Christine Howey

If your mortal enemy were in the same profession as you, chances are you’d wish him every failure imaginable, so that you could wallow in all his attendant misery. The Germans call it schadenfreude, and this kind of malicious gloating can certainly have its piquant moments of pleasure.

But Peter Shaffer, author of Amadeus, now being presented by the Great Lakes Theater Festival, might advise you to be careful what you wish for. Indeed, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, the precocious composing genius, was a giant thorn in the side of Antonio Salieri, court composer to Joseph II, the emperor of Austria. And for quite a bit of this drama, which is a freely imagined recreation of that contentious relationship, Salieri’s dreams do come true: Mozart’s brilliant music is often greeted with a shrug by his patron and the public, while Salieri’s comparatively mediocre tunes are hailed and richly rewarded. Yet this becomes Salieri’s most exquisite torment, since only he appears able to recognize Mozart’s genius – an awareness he can’t expunge from his mind.

This is just one of the fascinating meditations about art and morality that thread their way through this script, which is most well known for its cinematic version, featuring the cackling hyena laugh of Tom Hulce as Wolfgang and the malevolent glower of F. Murray Abraham’s Salieri. Shaffer’s writing often isn’t as sharp as some of his thematic thrusts; he reduces the musically inspired Mozart to the 18th-century equivalent of an idiot savant, focusing relentlessly on the young man’s adolescent sexual obsessions and propensity for baby talk. But the Great Lakes company does a splendid job of bringing this caricature and others down to something approaching human scale and finds some intriguing angles in the process.

In 1781 Vienna, the esteemed Salieri has heard of the young upstart composer, who’s been writing scores since he was six years old, but the older man is not prepared for his first confrontation with Wolfie. The preternaturally randy fellow, now 25, arrives chasing a delightedly shrieking woman and bellowing his interest in some lascivious ass-licking – either giving or taking; it’s all the same to him. This is just the first of many social and ethical boundaries that Mozart crosses, as he becomes a member of the court and begins writing the music that Salieri believes is aided by heavenly assistance. (Indeed, the name Amadeus means “God’s love.”)

Some of Shaffer’s finest descriptions emerge as Salieri battles these imponderables: How could God place such magnificent talent in a person so obviously devoid of moral goodness? His answer is that the deity is a “god of bargains… looking out at the world with dealer’s eyes.” And the bargain God has made with Mozart has left Salieri merely a mediocre bystander, showered with riches but doomed to musical oblivion. Driven by his hatred for God’s maniacal joke, Salieri sets out to destroy Wolfgang and suppress his infinitely complex compositions.

In the linchpin role, Andrew May stows many of his theatrical pyrotechnics and crafts a cramped and hollow Salieri, a man whose personality has been almost entirely erased by his laser-focused dislike and untrammeled envy of Mozart. When he quarrels with God – “You give me the desire and yet make me mute!” – May’s reproaches resonate with the bone-deep exhaustion of absolute agony. He is well matched by Ben Nordstrom’s wildly careening yet believable Mozart, a man who, for all his excesses, still knows the score. Speaking of his job as a composer in a royal court filled with pompous windbags, he explains, “We are servants, and we’ve built a gigantic palace of sound to celebrate mediocre lives. But who has served whom? It’s the music that will last, not their politics.”

Adding some necessary fun to the proceedings are Scott Plate and Nicholas Koesters as the venticelli, Salieri’s “little winds,” who flit about the castle goosing the gossip mill and executing Valley Boy “whateverrr” sighs in perfect unison. Dougfred Miller is also amusing as the dithering emperor, although his catchphrase, “Well, there it is!”, is repeated until it loses its lilt. George Roth as an Italian-spouting count and Kathryn Cherasaro as Mozart’s wife, Costanze, create sharply defined characters – especially in the latter’s case, when she is being pursued by Salieri as he tries to dismantle the young composer’s life.

This cast, under the deft direction of Gordon Reinhart, is so accomplished, one almost doesn’t notice how unnecessarily padded and overlong the script is, landing at three hours with intermission. And even though there are small quibbles – May’s aged Salieri and Nordstrom’s deathly ill Mozart seem a bit too similar to their younger and healthier selves – the production never loses its focus on the human symphony at hand: the agony of one man’s inescapable mediocrity and the personal devastation triggered by the other’s monumental talent.

West Side Leader
Almost perfect product at Great Lakes Theater Festival.
David Ritchey, Ph.D., American Theatre Critics Association

Seldom does everything come together in a stage production. But almost everything is perfect in Great Lakes Theater Festival’s (GLTF) production of “Amadeus,” on stage in rotating repertory with William Shakespeare’s “As You Like It” through Oct. 22 at the Ohio Theatre.

Playwright Peter Shaffer created a play that deals with the relationship between composers Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (1756-1791) and Antonio Salieri (1750-1825). When Salieri realizes Mozart is a better composer than he, Salieri makes destroying Mozart his life’s work.

“Amadeus” opened on Broadway in 1981 and received seven Tony nominations and five Tony Awards, including an award for a little known actor who has gone on to become a major star – Ian McKellen.

Religion is almost a third leading character in “Amadeus.” In addition to Mozart’s middle name and the title of the show, which is a reference to “gifted by God,” Salieri prays that he would be given a musical talent that would make him the outstanding composer of his time. Salieri recognizes Mozart’s superior talent and asks God to make his talent superior to Mozart’s. In a stunning scene, Salieri challenges God and then expects to be struck down by God. After Mozart’s death, Salieri slowly goes mad and finally kills himself because of his role in Mozart’s destruction.

In truth, little evidence exists that Salieri had any role in the downfall or death of Mozart. Salieri was the lesser composer, but he had a major influence on music through his students: Ludwig van Beethoven, Franz Schubert and Franz Liszt.

Shaffer’s script is mostly fiction, but it makes good theater.

The simple set provides an opportunity for the company to focus on the theatricality of Mozart’s works and the private lives of the two leading characters.

Director Gordon Reinhart must have the best job in theater. He worked with an excellent script and a great cast, and the results are spectacular.

The cast doesn’t have one weak link. One standout, however, is Andrew May’s (Salieri) performance, which is one of the best performances of any season. May as Salieri plays the villain of the story at two stages in his life – as a mature man and as an old man. May has the leading role, and it’s one of the largest roles written for any actor. He seems to have more than half of the lines in the play. May seems to reach down into his soul to bring Salieri to life. His performance is personal, intimate and devastating.

As Mozart, Ben Nordstrom has a showy, splashy role. The playwright wrote Mozart as immature and silly. He jumps and skips around the stage and has the most physical role I’ve seen in a nonmusical show. This Mozart moves toward madness and death as he loses his employment and has marital problems.

Nordstrom makes his debut with the GLTF in “Amadeus.” I hope this is the first of many opportunities we have to see Nordstrom work in Northeast Ohio.

The production does have two flaws. First, the lighting is so dim in certain scenes that it’s difficult to follow the action. Second, the performance is long. With one intermission, the performance ran almost three hours. However, that is simply because the show has a long script; the director kept the action moving at a brisk pace.

Tickets range in price between $21.50 and $55. Student tickets for any performance are $12.50. For ticket information, call (216) 241-6000 or order online.

Akron Beacon Journal
‘Amadeus’ gives Salieri a triumph: Andrew May portrays composer masterfully in play in Cleveland
Kerry Clawson

The dark, brooding confessional that is Amadeus provides a thoroughly gripping experience at Great Lakes Theater Festival.

Through the masterful work of actor Andrew May, we fully understand and empathize with court composer Antonio Salieri as his envy of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and his anger with God spark Salieri’s slow descent into hell.

Writer Peter Shaffer shows with great irony how God has played the ultimate trick on Salieri: Salieri aims to create absolute beauty through music, but instead, God has bestowed heavenly genius on the vulgar, childlike Mozart.

May goes back and forth in a believable manner as the elderly Salieri in a wheelchair, narrating the story as he looks back on the emptiness he achieved over 10 years of vengefulness.

The memory play is set in 1823 Vienna on the eve of Salieri’s death. His flashback tells the story from 1781 to 1791 of how Salieri made it his principal mission to destroy Mozart’s life and career.

Early in the play, a brokenhearted Salieri, who has always strived to do good, says he hears the “voice of God” coming from an “obscene child.”

The pained look on May’s face every time Salieri is in Mozart’s presence is priceless.

Mozart’s entrance is unforgettable as actor Ben Nordstrom plays a wild cat-and-mouse game with Kathryn Cherasaro’s Costanze, complete with squeaks and bawdy behavior.

His Mozart’s language and behavior are blunt, irreverent and hilarious. The youthful-looking Nordstrom plays the prodigy with an immature, devil-may-care attitude – he knows he’s the best composer around, and he’s quite cocky about it. But quickly, he alienates himself with his vulgar, socially unacceptable behavior.

It’s ironic that the Viennese people and others in Europe didn’t value what a genius Mozart was in his lifetime: In this play, only Salieri knew how virtuosic Mozart’s work was.

“He, from the ordinary, created legends, and I, from legends, created only the ordinary,” Salieri said of Mozart’s opera Don Giovanni.

In secondary roles, Scott Plate and Nicholas Koesters are very funny as the gossipy Venticello No. 1 and No. 2, Salieri’s “little winds” who spy for him. These men with the white-powdered faces are certainly vicious and catty, but one wonders why director Gordon Reinhart has chosen for them to behave so effeminately.

Regardless, it’s good to see these fine local actors in sizable roles with juicy lines to work with (unlike their tiny parts in Great Lakes’ previous You Can’t Take It With You). Their many comic strokes include the knowing looks they give each other as they are dismissed, and their repeated, judgmental “hmmms,” uttered in unison.

Also excellent is Cherasaro as Mozart’s wife, Costanze Weber, who’s willing to go to dangerous lengths to keep her husband’s career alive. She vividly paints the low-class Costanze as being as playful as Mozart, but also as a real human being nearly destroyed by poverty.

The Great Lakes set by Gage Williams is highly elegant, depicting the Austrian emperor’s court, fine homes and concert halls, dominated by a grand piano and gold accents.

Amadeus, which premiered in London, moved to Broadway in 1980, where it won five 1981 Tonys, including best play. The show was made into a 1984 film that won eight Oscars, followed by a 1999 Broadway revival.

The show is full of wonderfully terrifying ironies. When Salieri realized he’d never be remembered as a great composer, he was sure he’d at least be remembered as the man who destroyed Mozart. But the ultimate irony is, although he was celebrated in his day, Salieri’s name today is completely eclipsed by his brilliant rival’s.

The Times Newspapers
‘Amadeus’ is overly long, but intrigues at GLTF
Roy Berko

Whispers fill the theater. We can distinguish nothing at first from the snakelike hissing except the word “Salieri” repeated here, there and then the barely distinguishable word “Assassin!” Thus starts Peter Shaffer’s ‘Amadeus,’ now on stage in repertoire with ‘As You Like It,’ at Great Lakes Theatre Festival.

‘Amadeus’ is loosely based on the lives of the composers Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and Antonio Salieri. The script was inspired by ‘Mozart and Salieri,’ a short play by Aleksandr Pushkin. It is a play of greed, lust, betrayal, intrigue and jealousy.

The title refers to an identification that Mozart often used as his pen name. The name, in German, means “God-lover” or “Loved by God.” This identification is quite significant, as the title not only refers to Mozart, but Salieri’s relationship with God, an important aspect of the plot.

Originating at the National Theatre of Great Britain, ‘Amadeus’ won the Evening Standard Drama Award and, later, in the United States, the play won the coveted Tony Award. It went on to become a critically acclaimed major motion picture which won eight Oscars, including Best Picture.

The time is the 1800s, the place is Vienna, a city of musicians, where the aged Salieri narrates his plot to destroy Mozart, who he considers to be “God’s preferred creature.”

The real Antonio Salieri is presently known as the man who lived in the shadow of Mozart; but in his time, he was the court Kappellmeister, and had among his students Schubert and Beethoven. And, from the standpoint of reality, he was probably far from the character in the play. There is no historical record of his plotting the death of Mozart, which is the strong underlying theme of the script.

As for Mozart, there is probably no man who has had his music played for such a long time. He was a boy genius who unfortunately was also a child-like, often childish man, who never really understood his role as an adult.

The Great Lakes Theatre Festival’s production is very good, though excessively long and doesn’t have the overall effect that it might. Neither of these is totally the Festivals’ fault. Shaffer has rewritten the play at least six times. In the latest version, which is the one GLTF chose to produce, the ending has been changed. We do not see Mozart’s supposed killer, a real or imagined phantom in a flowing black cloak, much like the traditional version of the death figure.

We don’t see Mozart’s final moments before death envelops him. This weakens the final product.

In addition, on opening night the production lagged a little. One can only conjecture that this was not director Gordon Reinhart’s decision, but simply the fact that, due to financial restraints, the cast had not had preview performances to learn how to gauge the audience’s reactions and fall into a comfortable pattern. This problem should be alleviated as the show runs through its production dates.

GLTF audiences have gotten used to viewing Andrew May as the comic supreme. It is nice to see May given the opportunity to flap his dramatic wings. May comes through in grand style. He makes for a very believable and properly tortured Salieri.

Ben Nordstom (Mozart) is wonderful in the child-like sequences. His weakness is in making the transition into desperation as death nears. Part of this, again, may be the script. Because of the plot alterations Nordstrom doesn’t get the opportunity to show Mozart’s complete mental and physical collapse.

Scott Plate and Nicholas Koesters are wonderful as Salieri’s “Little Winds” – gossip mongers. They flit around the stage and into the audience whispering, making up tales, commenting on reality and illusion with great relish.

Dougfred Miller makes for an excellent Joseph II, Emperor of Austria and Kathryn Chesaro is equally as good as Constanze, Mozart’s wife.

Capsule Judgement
GLTF’s ‘Amadeus’ is well worth seeing. Do not, however, expect the same power as the film version, as Shaffer’s new ending robs audiences of some of the depth of the emotional impact of Mozart’s final demise.

‘Amadeus’ and ‘As You Like It’ and are running in tandem through October 22. For tickets to any GLTF production call 216-241-6000 or 800-766-6048, or order online.

Photos: As You Like It

Cleveland actors Nina Domingue as Audrey and Marc Moritz as Touchstone take center stage in Great Lakes Theater Festival’s Fall Repertory production of As You Like It which runs in rotating repertory with Peter Shaffer’s Amadeus through October 22nd at the Ohio Theatre, Playhouse Square Center. Photograph by Roger Mastroianni
Cleveland favorites Dudley Swetland as Corin (left) and Marc Moritz as Touchstone (right) take center stage in Great Lakes Theater Festival’s Fall Repertory production of As You Like It which runs in rotating repertory with Peter Shaffer’s Amadeus through October 22nd at the Ohio Theatre, Playhouse Square Center. Photograph by Roger Mastroianni		Cleveland favorites Derdriu Ring as Phebe and Nicholas Koesters as Silvius take center stage in Great Lakes Theater Festival’s Fall Repertory production of As You Like It which runs in rotating repertory with Peter Shaffer’s Amadeus through October 22nd at the Ohio Theatre, Playhouse Square Center. Photograph by Roger Mastroianni
Great Lakes Theater Festival’s Fall Repertory company toasts the opening of Cleveland’s fall theater season in its production of As You Like It. (center: Jeff Cribbs; front row from left to right: Phillip Carroll and Benji Reid; back row from left to right: E.B. Smith, Dougfred Miller, Jerry Vogel, Scott Plate, George Roth and Tom Weaver). As You Like It runs in rotating repertory with Peter Shaffer’s Amadeus through October 22nd at the Ohio Theatre, Playhouse Square Center. Photograph by Roger Mastroianni
Jeff Cribbs as Orlando and Julie Evan Smith as Rosalind share a moment in Great Lakes Theater Festival’s Fall Repertory production of As You Like It which runs in rotating repertory with Peter Shaffer’s Amadeus through October 22nd at the Ohio Theatre, Playhouse Square Center. Photograph by Roger Mastroianni
Paul Kiernan as Oliver and Kathryn Cherasaro as Celia share an intimate moment in Great Lakes Theater Festival’s Fall Repertory production of As You Like It which runs in rotating repertory with Peter Shaffer’s Amadeus through October 22nd at the Ohio Theatre, Playhouse Square Center. Photograph by Roger Mastroianni
Actor Dougfred Miller as Jacques takes center stage in Great Lakes Theater Festival’s Fall Repertory production of As You Like It which runs in rotating repertory with Peter Shaffer’s Amadeus through October 22nd at the Ohio Theatre, Playhouse Square Center. Photograph by Roger Mastroianni
Jeff Cribbs as Orlando and Julie Evan Smith as Rosalind share a moment in Great Lakes Theater Festival’s Fall Repertory production of As You Like It which runs in rotating repertory with Peter Shaffer’s Amadeus through October 22nd at the Ohio Theatre, Playhouse Square Center. Photograph by Roger Mastroianni		Actors Kathryn Cherasaro (below, as Celia) Marc Moritz (top left, as Touchstone) and Julie Evan Smith (top right, as Rosalind) laugh it up in As You Like It, the second production in Great Lakes Theater Festival’s Fall Repertory. As You Like It runs in rotating repertory with Peter Shaffer’s Amadeus through October 22nd at the Ohio Theatre, Playhouse Square Center. Photograph by Roger Mastroianni
Jeff Cribbs as Orlando and Julie Evan Smith as Rosalind embrace as Kathryn Cherasaro watches on as Celia in Great Lakes Theater Festival’s Fall Repertory production of As You Like It which runs in rotating repertory with Peter Shaffer’s Amadeus through October 22nd at the Ohio Theatre, Playhouse Square Center. Photograph by Roger Mastroianni
(From left to right) Actors Tom Weaver, Scott Plate, Benji Reid, Dougfred Miller and E.B. Smith comprise a rock solid supporting cast in Great Lakes Theater Festival’s Fall Repertory production of As You Like It which runs in rotating repertory with Peter Shaffer’s Amadeus through October 22nd at the Ohio Theatre, Playhouse Square Center. Photograph by Roger Mastroianni
		Jeff Cribbs as Orlando (down left) and Julie Evan Smith as Rosalind (down right) exchange vows as Kathryn Cherasaro brokers the ceremony in Great Lakes Theater Festival’s Fall Repertory production of As You Like It which runs in rotating repertory with Peter Shaffer’s Amadeus through October 22nd at the Ohio Theatre, Playhouse Square Center. Photograph by Roger Mastroianni

Photos: Amadeus

		Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (top – actor, Ben Nordstrom) rides his wife, Costanze Weber (bottom – Kathryn Cherasaro) in Amadeus, the opening production of Great Lakes Theater Festival’s Fall Repertory. Amadeus runs in rotating repertory with William Shakespeare’s As You Like It through October 22nd at the Ohio Theatre, Playhouse Square Center. Photograph by Roger Mastroianni
Cleveland favorite, Andrew May stars as Antonio Salieri in Amadeus, the opening production of Great Lakes Theater Festival’s Fall Repertory. Amadeus runs in rotating repertory with William Shakespeare’s As You Like It through October 22nd at the Ohio Theatre, Playhouse Square Center. Photograph by Roger Mastroianni
Ben Nordstrom stars as the title character (foreground) while actor, Dougfred Miller watches on as Joseph II (background) in Amadeus, the opening production of Great Lakes Theater Festival’s Fall Repertory. Amadeus runs in rotating repertory with William Shakespeare’s As You Like It through October 22nd at the Ohio Theatre, Playhouse Square Center. Photograph by Roger Mastroianni
Cleveland favorite, Andrew May stars as Antonio Salieri in Amadeus, the opening production of Great Lakes Theater Festival’s Fall Repertory. Amadeus runs in rotating repertory with William Shakespeare’s As You Like It through October 22nd at the Ohio Theatre, Playhouse Square Center. Photograph by Roger Mastroianni
Cleveland actors George Roth (left) and Andrew May right share the Ohio Theatre stage as Count Orsini-Rosenberg and Antonio Salieri in Amadeus, the opening production of Great Lakes Theater Festival’s Fall Repertory. Amadeus runs in rotating repertory with William Shakespeare’s As You Like It through October 22nd at the Ohio Theatre, Playhouse Square Center. Photograph by Roger Mastroianni
Ben Nordstrom stars as the title character (foreground) while actors, Kathryn Cherasaro (Costanze Weber), Dougfred Miller (Joseph II) and Paul Kiernan (Johann von Strack) watch on in Amadeus, the opening production of Great Lakes Theater Festival’s Fall Repertory. Amadeus runs in rotating repertory with William Shakespeare’s As You Like It through October 22nd at the Ohio Theatre, Playhouse Square Center. Photograph by Roger Mastroianni
Ben Nordstrom stars as the title character in Amadeus, the opening production of Great Lakes Theater Festival’s Fall Repertory. Amadeus runs in rotating repertory with William Shakespeare’s As You Like It through October 22nd at the Ohio Theatre, Playhouse Square Center. Photograph by Roger Mastroianni
Actors Ben Nordstrom (Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart), Andrew May (Antonio Salieri) and Derdriu Ring (Katherina Cavalieri) share the stage in Amadeus, the opening production of Great Lakes Theater Festival’s Fall Repertory. Amadeus runs in rotating repertory with William Shakespeare’s As You Like It through October 22nd at the Ohio Theatre, Playhouse Square Center. Photograph by Roger Mastroianni