{"id":6748,"date":"2017-07-25T07:24:36","date_gmt":"2017-07-25T11:24:36","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/?p=6748"},"modified":"2017-07-31T09:42:00","modified_gmt":"2017-07-31T13:42:00","slug":"a-midsummer-nights-dream","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/?p=6748","title":{"rendered":"A Midsummer Night’s Dream"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"A

Austin Blunk, Courtney McGowan, & Vanessa Morosco; photo: Jerry Dalia<\/p><\/div>\n

This staple of outdoor summer stages\u2014Shakespeare\u2019s most frequently performed play\u2014is on view in a delightful production from The Shakespeare Theatre of New Jersey through July 30. STNJ\u2019s annual outdoor productions are performed in the beautiful Greek amphitheatre of the College of Saint Elizabeth in Florham Park, N.J. (take cushions).<\/p>\n

STNJ artistic director Bonnie Monte directed the production, and she must have had a very precise idea in mind, because she served as the set and costume designer as well, inspired perhaps by Shakespeare\u2019s own words in the play:<\/p>\n

“I have had a most rare vision. I have had a dream,
\npast the wit of man to say what dream it was.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

\"A

Felix Mayes; photo: Jerry Dalia<\/p><\/div>\n

The sets on the outdoor stage are always fairly simple, but the costumes were knock-your-socks off. Creative recycling was the theme, with iridescent CD\u2019s forming a glittering backdrop for both the forest outside Athens\u2014the fairy world\u2014and a scaly cape for fairy queen Titania. Puck was gleefully porcupinish with headgear and epaulets sprouting colorful chopsticks? pens? A bathtub was filled with wine corks. More than thirty individuals and families received recognition in the program for aid in collecting the hundreds of \u201citems of refuse\u201d that went into the production. This made sense, actually, fairies being notorious pilferers.<\/p>\n

We went to a matinee where numerous children were in the audience\u2014an outdoor theater is one venue where sitting still and silent in your seat is not an absolute requirement, particularly for a comedy. Some of the complicated plot\u2014the two sets of characters, the two sets of lovers, the play-within-a-play\u2014may have been difficult for the youngest audience members to follow precisely, but there was such effective physical comedy and so many hilarious touches, like the performance of Ian Hersey as the ass, Bottom, they stuck with it happily.<\/p>\n

The cast had many suitably antic performances, including the aforementioned Hersey and Felix Mayes as Puck, Courtney McGowen as Lion, Vanessa Morosco as Titania, and all of the fancifully costumed fairies.<\/p>\n

STNJ produces an excellent KnowTheShow<\/a> guide. Call box office for tickets (973-408-5600) or email: BoxOffice@ShakespeareNJ.org<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This staple of outdoor summer stages\u2014Shakespeare\u2019s most frequently performed play\u2014is on view in a delightful production from The Shakespeare Theatre of New Jersey through July 30. STNJ\u2019s annual outdoor productions are performed in the beautiful Greek amphitheatre of the College … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"A Midsummer Night's Dream - summer, the season for lovers and theater lovers at Shakespeare Theatre of New Jersey","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[272,5,394,104,147],"tags":[1106,597,197,553],"class_list":["post-6748","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-comedy","category-imagination","category-romance","category-the-morgue","category-theater","tag-a-midsummer-nights-dream","tag-bonnie-monte","tag-shakespeare","tag-shakespeare-theatre-of-new-jersey"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p2NkiT-1KQ","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6748","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=6748"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6748\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6751,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6748\/revisions\/6751"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=6748"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=6748"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=6748"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}