THEATER REVIEW: The Hound of the Baskervilles at Shakespeare & Company

Submitted by Lesley Ann Beck on September 25, 2009 - 4:06pm
Theater

 

The Hound of the Baskervilles
By Steve Canny and John Nicholson
Directed by Tony Simotes
(Elayne P. Bernstein Theatre, Shakespeare & Company, Lenox, Mass., 186
seats, $16-$48)
A Shakespeare & Company production of a play in two acts
 
Jonathan Croy                                            Man #1
Josh Aaron McCabe                                 Man #2
Ryan Winkles                                             Man #3
Yvonne Cone, Kara D. Midlam,
Sam Parrott, Ethan Weiss                       Servants
 
Reviewed by Lesley Ann Beck
 
“The game is afoot” –King Henry IV
 
The American premiere of The Hound of the Baskervilles, a new production at Shakespeare & Company, is laugh-out-loud funny all the way though. Three actors move at full Victorian-era-steam-engine speed through two acts, playing sixteen parts, telling a fairly complex mystery story, moving scenery and changing costumes, and being amazingly entertaining all at the same time.
 
The wacky adaptation of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s famous story is by Steve Canny and John Nicholson, directed by Shakespeare & Company artistic director Tony Simotes. The plot survives more or less intact in the show; one after another, the male heirs of the aristocratic Baskerville family are killed by a terrifying, spectral hound. Sherlock Holmes, the self-proclaimed “greatest detective of all time,” is summoned to prevent Sir Henry Baskerville from suffering the same fate. He takes the case, sending his associate, Dr. Watson, to the countryside to watch over Sir Henry, and, naturally, mayhem of various kinds ensues.
 
The preset is Holmes’s office, with a chess set on the desk, a settee, a draped pedestal with a scruffy stuffed bird, and a door frame the only furnishings. The black floor is covered with a pattern of white paw prints. Ryan Winkles as Dr. Mortimer supplies the back story, reading from an ancient scroll, and the game is, indeed, afoot.
 
Jonathan Croy plays just one character. He is terrific as Dr. Watson throughout, scribbling little notes to Holmes, making incorrect assumptions about the suspects, and shooting his revolver rather more often than necessary; this Dr. Watson is a little trigger happy.
 
The other two actors, Josh Aaron McCabe and Ryan Winkles, portray long lists of characters, so enlist that oh-so-convenient tool of the regular theater-goer, the willing suspension of disbelief, and just enjoy.
 
McCabe’s performance is dazzling. He portrays Sherlock Holmes, complete with caped overcoat, deerstalker, and outsized ego. He also gives us Stapleton, a mysterious character with an eyepatch and rustic wooden crutch, and is adorable as Stapleton’s sister Cecile, a fetching Brazilian beauty in a flounced frock. Cecile is particularly skillful in snapping a pair of folding fans open and closed to underscore her warnings to the smitten Sir Henry Baskerville. McCabe is also Barrymore, the butler, who appears with platters of enormous, glossy, papier mache food, whisking them away again before anyone can dine. He also plays the sobbing housekeeper, Mrs. Barrymore, and the less-than-helpful Yokel #1, among others.
 
Winkles is excellent as well; he plays Sir Henry Baskerville with a winsome air and he seems to have a great deal of trouble keeping his pants up. He also appears as the aforementioned Dr. Mortimer, a cockney cabdriver, and an assortment of yokels.
 
Physical humor abounds; there is a wickedly funny sight gag with towels; a hilarious sequence where Watson and Sir Henry try to avoid being sucked into the local swamp called the Grimpen Mire; a running gag involving farm animals in burlap sacks; and a lively duel between two men armed with a walking stick and a crutch. There’s no need to struggle to figure out the mystery as it unfolds in Act One; to open the second act, the actors provide a lightning fast (and, of course, hilarious) reprise of the earlier scenes.
 
There is a fairly high degree of silliness in this production, but please do not interpret that as in any way slapdash or haphazard. This is a finely calibrated ensemble effort, performed by highly skilled actors, and the direction is spot on. The astute observer may note echoes of French farce and Commedia techniques, to say nothing of classic vaudeville shtick, but what matters is that the show is really, really funny.
 
The movable set pieces that establish each of the many locations are shifted with speed and precision by a team of four actors in servant’s black garb. The costumes are brilliant, as are the dressers backstage who seamlessly transform two actors over and over again. The sound effects add just the right eerie (and slightly over-the-top) touches to the performance.
 
I’ll be going back for another evening of laughs; in the meantime, I’m inspired to get a pair of those folding fans and start snapping them open and closed while dancing the tango. [September 2009]
 
Set design, Jim Youngerman; Lighting design, Steve Ball; Costume design, Govane Lohbauer; Sound design, Michael Pfeiffer; Stage manager, Molly Hennighausen; Composer, Alexander Sovronsky
(Through November 8; running time two hours)
Photos by Kevin Sprague, courtesy Shakespeare & Company

 

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