Women get more to say in Much Ado About Nothing

Much Ado About Nothing

By William Shakespeare, additional text by Erin Shields, directed by Chris Abraham. At the Festival Theatre, 55 Queen St., Stratford, through October 27. Stratfest.com or 1-800-567-1600.

Once again with galvanizing confidence, director Chris Abraham casts new light on a Shakespeare comedy by reading it through a contemporary lens on the Stratford Festival Theatre stage.

In 2014, he put a new spin on the familiar “A Midsummer Night’s Dream” by presenting as an entertainment at a same-sex wedding celebration (I saw that production and very much enjoyed it). The next year, he added a new framing device to “The Taming of the Shrew” (which I regretted not seeing) to tame the play’s misogyny.

This time he’s brought in award-wining playwright Erin Shields to add text to “Much Ado about Nothing” to give its female characters more voice and agency — and, in the delightful, complex performance of Maev Beaty as Beatrice, more comic fodder. Movingly and perhaps against the odds, the message of the show ends up being about the capacity of people, even men, to change.

Graham Abbey perfectly matches Beaty as her verbal sparring partner and true-love-all-along Benedick. Stratford programmed this production for the 2020 Stratford season that never happened, and it’s as gratifying to see these two brilliant actors lock wits as one imagines it must be for them to finally deliver the show.

The overall premise of the play — familiar to some from Kenneth Branagh’s 1993 film version — is that a bunch of military heroes led by Don Pedro (André Sills) roll up for a month at the country estate of wealthy Leonato (Patrick McManus) and romantic intrigue ensues.

In a program note, Abraham says that the play cracked open for him when he realized that “nothing” was slang for lady parts. Yup, Shakespeare’s audiences would have understood the show’s title as “Much Ado about a Vagina.”

This indeed illuminates the play and points to what can make it difficult for contemporary audiences. The vagina in question is that of beautiful Hero (Allison Edwards-Crewe), Leonato’s daughter, whose romance with Claudio (Austin Eckert) is thrown into crisis when dastardly Don John (Michael Blake) dupes Claudio into thinking that Hero cheated on him.

This sends this comedic romp into an ugly place in the second act, as the patriarchy turns hard on Hero. After Claudio violently shoves her away from him and calls her a “rotten orange,” Edwards-Crewe keens and sobs as her father rails down shame on her (McManus’s fury was so believable I nearly had to look away).

Two strands of action come together to rectify the situation: a plot proposed by Friar Francis (Gordon Patrick White) and led by Beatrice to fake Hero’s death, and a boisterous scheme in which the doofuses Dogberry (Josue Laboucane) and Conrade (Cyrus Lane) uncover the truth about Hero’s supposed unfaithfulness, abetted by a slapstick troupe of dim-witted townspeople armed with pitchforks and an ear horn.

In Shakespeare’s text, Hero has few spoken lines, which is infuriating given that it’s her nothing the ado is all about. Shields has given her more to say including a sensitively written new scene in which she and Claudio try to find their way back to each other. It’s here that the idea of growing and changing together is spoken outright. But it’s also there in Benedick’s character arc, as he transforms from cocky blowhard to unlikely feminist avenger.

Abbey’s Benedick hilariously casts the audience as his scene partner, as when he gets a spectator to take off one of his boots after the serving maids Ursula (Akosua Amo-Adem) and Margaret (Déjah Dixon-Green) haughtily refuse to. But we also witness him stepping up when he realizes that loving Beatrice means fighting for what she believes in.

Shields gives Beatrice pride of place with a new show-opening monologue, and from early on Beaty builds in layer after layer of her performance as a fiercely intelligent, vulnerable woman who’s been burned by Benedick but just can’t help seeking out his company.

The most delightful part of the production for me are back-to-back scenes before the intermission in which Benedick and Beatrice are hoodwinked into thinking the other is in love with them. This is full-bore physical comedy, with Abbey’s Benedick pratfalling down a flight of stairs and using a huge potted plant as a shield as he moves across the stage, and Beaty’s Beatrice getting her ears blown out when she hides under a banquet table and Ursula pounds on it.

What makes these scenes so great is not just the excellence of the staging and playing but the emotional truth underneath them. These two weirdos climb up and fall out of the same tree it because the very notion that the other might love them is the most thrilling possible thing in the world.

Abraham once again pairs with designer Julie Fox and her set is beyond sumptuous: that gorgeous tree lifting up to the high ceiling of the Festival Theatre, a stepped blond-tile floor lined with terracotta pottery and flowers, a wrought-iron gate marking the entrance to Leonato’s compound. It’s like a travel ad for Sicily you want to step into.

Thomas Ryder Payne’s sound design and composition add further to the Mediterranean atmosphere: Crickets chirp as the audience comes in and we sometimes hear birdsong, and a three-person band led by George Meanwell frequently appears onstage to serenade the action. Fox’s attractive costumes keep to the early Modern setting with some striking touches, in particular Hero’s crimson wedding dress.

At three hours long the show requires endurance, but Abraham’s sure hand and the excellence of the large ensemble bring the audience along, even through the second-act swerve into the patriarchal abyss. At the end everyone’s rewarded with a dance-party curtain call (choreography by Adrienne Gould).

I can’t wait to see what wonky Shakespeare comedy Abraham takes on next.