Amy Freed returns to South Coast Repertory with another hit-or-miss (but mostly miss) World Premiere comedy, this time a purportedly feminist take on William Shakespeare’s The Taming Of The Shrew retitled simply Shrew!

 Things start off promisingly enough with a prologue that has aspiring 16th-century Writer (Susannah Rogers) confessing to innkeeper Mistress Slapbottom (Colette Kilroy) that to be taken seriously she’s been passing herself off as a man, an impersonation that backfired when the revelation of her true gender caused a certain fellow writer’s group member to lose romantic interest in her.

Not only that, but with said playwright’s The Taming Of A Shrew offering little to Writer’s liking, she has decided to “take up quill, ink, and paper” and show the world “how it should have gone.”

Shakespeare buffs will smile in recognition at Shrew!’s familiar cast of characters, among them Baptista Minola (Martin Kildare) and his two marriageable daughters, the shrewish, mannish Katherine (Rogers) and the beautiful but dimwitted Bianca (Sierra Jolene), the former of whom must tie the marital knot before the latter can even think of happily wedded bliss with someone like Lucentio (Brett Ryback), who changes places with his servant Tranio (Jeremy Peter Johnson), the better to woo Bianca as her tutor.

 Also along for the mock-Shakespearean ride are Bianca suitors 2 and 3, aka Hortensio (Peter Frechette) and Gremio (Mike McShane), a couple of clowns (Bhama Roget as Biondello and Danny Scheie as Grumio), a Merchant and a Priest (Stephen Caffrey), a Widow (Kilroy), and Lucentio’s tomato-growing father Vincentio (Matt Orduña, who doubles as a Wedding Singer).

Last but not least, there’s Petruchio (Elijah Alexander), the  hunky Veronese who’s come to Padua to tame the shrew.

 Playwright Freed’s mix of Shakespearean-style English with contemporary slang does have its charms, as when Hortensio complains that Katherine “rails and spews a steady flow of wit, and never puts a cork in it to give man a rest.”

Still, for the most part, there seems little reason to rewrite The Bard if said rewrite ends up a two-hour-long Saturday Night Live skit overloaded with corny one-liners that mostly fall flat, sudden spurts of burlesque-level humor, and a downright bizarre sequence featuring what Freed’s script describes as “hunched and hooded servants … clos[ing] in around Katherine in a feral circle.” (Say what?)

As for Shrew!’s supposed feminist take on Shakespeare’s original, you pretty much have to wait for Katherine’s eleventh-hour soliloquy to find much difference from Shakes save in quality.

Even director Art Manke and a talented cast can’t make Shrew! work any better than did Freed’s previous You, Nero (“more silly than sophisticated and more than a tad too long”) or The Monster Builder (“a bit too much of the quirky and bizarre”).

 At the very least, Shrew! looks fabulous if familiar on Ralph Funicello’s recycled Shakespeare In Love set, with David Kay Mickelsen’s amusingly quirky takes on Elizabethan fashion, Jaymi Lee Smith’s vibrant lighting, and composer Steven Cahill’s soundscape completing a top-notch production design and Ken Merckx choreographing an amusingly slapstick fight sequence.

John Glore is dramaturg. Joshua Marchesi is production manager. Lara K. Powell is stage manager and Kathryn Davies is assistant stage manager. Casting is by Joanne DeNaut, CSA.

 Shrew! is the sixth Amy Freed play commissioned by South Coast Repertory. I’ve seen only seen half of them, but for this reviewer at least, it’s three strikes and she’s out.

South Coast Repertory, 655 Town Center Drive, Costa Mesa.
www.scr.org

–Steven Stanley
April 3, 2018
Photos: Debora Robinson/SCR

Tags: Amy Freed, Orange County Theater Review, South Coast Repertory