Whether you love the entirety of the Porters of Hellgate’s All’s Well That Ends Well, or enjoy some parts of it more than others, will likely depend on how much of a William Shakespeare fan you are where this “problem comedy” is concerned.

Not that the Porters’ latest, their 30th excursion into the Shakespeare canon in eighteen years (leaving just four more plays to go) isn’t terrifically acted and imaginatively directed by Shakespeare ace Will Block.

It most certainly is, though the story Shakespeare has to tell this time round isn’t nearly as engaging as those of The Bard’s Greatest Hits, two of which (As You Like It and A Midsummer Night’s Dream) have yet to be staged.

An absolutely delightful Cindy Nguyen stars as plucky heroine Helena (referred to as Helen throughout the play) opposite a wonderfully warm Dawn Alden as the Countess who has raised Helen since her father’s untimely death, and the instantly engaging Daniel Kim is the Countess’s son Bertram, not only the apple of his mother’s eye but the object of a love-struck Helen’s unrequited affections.

Paying no heed to Bertram’s decided indifference, Helen follows the man of her dreams to Paris, where Bertram has set up residence with France’s ailing King (a majestic Time Winters), soon to be transformed from debilitated to dynamic thanks to the ministrations of physician’s daughter Helen.

No wonder then that the grateful monarch offers Helen her choice of husbands, upon which she quickly picks Bertram (no surprise there), though sadly for Helen the dreamboat in question wants to have nothing to do with his bride on their honeymoon night.

Things bog down, for this reviewer at least, when “comic relief” arrives in the person of a pair fools (Jono Eiland as as Paroles and Thomas Bigley as Lavatch, both topnotch), royal advisor Lafeu (Gus Krieger, droll as always), and a couple of Lords named Dumaine (a perfectly paired Sean Faye and Tiago Santos), multiple subplots I find considerably less engaging than those of Shakespeare’s more frequently revived comedies, which is doubtless one reason that All’s Well That Ends Well isn’t nearly as entertaining as Twelfth Night or Midsummer Night’s Dream.

Thank goodness then that All’s Well picks up speed with the late-in-the-show arrival of country virgin Diana (a charming Kodi Jackman, prime for her own Porters lead) agrees to let Helen take her place in bed with an unsuspecting Bertram, the better to conceive his child and steal his ring, thereby fulfilling some rather bizarre marriage conditions set forth by Bertram earlier in the play.

(Jackman is joined by a fine Michelle N. Grey in playing multiple roles, the former as Diana, the Duke of Florence, and a Young Lord) and the latter as The Widow, Rinaldo, and a second young lord.)

Still, at a hefty two hours and forty minutes, I for one found it rather a long wait for all that’s well to finally end well-ish, and sacrilegious as it may be to Bard lovers, I honestly wouldn’t mind it if every Shakespeare play I attended were trimmed down to ninety minutes no intermission.

It also doesn’t help on-the-fencers like me that the Porters’ latest takes place on an entirely bare stage save some ingeniously employed white gauze hangings or that Jessica Pasternak’s costumes, while effectively evoking the production’s WWI time frame (e.g., drab soldiers’ and nurses’ uniforms), aren’t the eye feasts that a different era would provide.

Fortunately, Matt Richter’s lighting design is vivid, varied, and often electrifying (save for one sequence lit so dimly, it discourages alertness), and Nick Neidorf’s sound design and original music are both topnotch.

All’s Well That Ends Well is produced for the Porters Of Hellsgate by Evan Isaac Lipkin. Maria Vasileva is assistant director. Roella Dellosa is stage manager.

The departure of Porters Of Hellsgate Founding Artistic Director Charles Pasternak last year to head Santa Cruz Shakespeare left some pretty big shoes to fill, but fill them quite splendidly Will Block has.

Though All’s Well That Ends Well didn’t end up captivating me as thoroughly as one of Shakespeare’s more frequently revived comedies most likely would have, whenever the focus was on Helena and Bertram, I was entirely there for the ride.

The Broadwater Black Box, 6322 Santa Monica Blvd, Hollywood.
www.portersofhellsgate.com

–Steven Stanley
November 18, 2023
Photos: Jesse Saler

Tags: Broadwater Blackbox, Los Angeles Theater Review, Porters Of Hellsgate, William Shakespeare