I admit it: I got a little weepy, last week at Boscobel House and Gardens in Garrison-on-Hudson. But I had good reason. It’s one of my top “happy places,” and that night was the last time I’ll ever see a Shakespeare play performed there, after many years of such sublime pleasures. In this case it was The Tempest, for obvious reasons. No other play would do for a permanent farewell.
In case you missed it, the Hudson Valley Shakespeare Festival, in residence at Boscobel for 34 years now, will be moving on in 2022. A gift from celebrated Garrison-based philanthropist Christopher Davis, its new, permanent home will be in nearby Philipstown, on the site of the Garrison Golf Course. There’s a restaurant and a pub at the new location, buildings that can be used to house artists-in-residence for the season, plenty of room to erect a big tent for open-air summer theater as well as a year-round indoor performance space. And this time, HVSF will own its home outright, instead of having to lease it from another not-for-profit.
So, the news is good. It’s even said that the panorama of the Hudson Highlands from the new site is every bit as spectacular as the one that audiences have grown to cherish at Boscobel. (We’ll see about that, next year.) Still, it was a wrench to say goodbye, to feel the sand of the pit stage under my feet for a final time, to watch the last vestiges of dusk fade as the lights winked on at West Point and the stars came out over Storm King.
Leaving was the toughest moment, but another one that wrung a few tears was the middle section of the famous speech in Act IV that begins with “Our revels now are ended” and wraps up with “We are such stuff / As dreams are made on, and our little life / Is rounded with a sleep.” In between (and much less frequently quoted), Prospero predicts how “the great globe itself / Yea, all which it inherit, shall dissolve, / And, like this insubstantial pageant faded / Leave not a rack behind.” Picture that “globe” with an upper-case G and there’s no escaping the fact that, in this play traditionally regarded as Shakespeare’s last great work, the Bard is literally bidding his own theater farewell.
Then, in Act V, the aging mage, now that he has reclaimed his stolen dukedom, gets another classic soliloquy about breaking and burying his staff, drowning his grimoire, abjuring his “rough magic.” It’s nigh universally regarded as Shakespeare’s retirement speech. How could the good folks at HVSF have chosen any other vehicle for their victory lap?
Fortunately, it’s also a terrific play — this reviewer’s personal favorite. And this is a fabulous production, directed by HVSF veteran Ryan Quinn and featuring a diverse, vibrant cast that mixes talented newcomers with beloved company stalwarts, including founders Kurt Rhoads and Nance Williamson as Stephano and Queen Alonso, respectively.
Being a longtime fan of Jason O’Connell, HVSF’s king of comedy, I was delighted to learn that he’d been cast as Prospero’s monstrous servant Caliban. He could’ve taken the character for a completely slapstick turn and I’d have been content, but he went that one better: O’Connell made us care and feel pity for the captive creature, even while conveying his beastly essence with barks and scurrying about on all fours. Critical analyses of The Tempest in recent decades have tended to spin it as an allegory on colonialism, and the actor (and presumably the director) made room for that interpretation, without beating the audience over the head with didactic deconstructivism.
In writing about this production, Quinn has indicated that, as the father of a young daughter, his primary emphasis is on The Tempest as a story about the scary prospect of a grown child leaving the nest. And indeed, we see Howard W. Overshown render Prospero as more of a worried, overprotective parent than as a wronged aristocrat seeking justice by manipulating the weather and a pack of spirits. Kayla Coleman exudes wide-eyed naïveté as young Miranda, but also gets a pithy #metoo moment of facing down her would-be rapist Caliban toward the end. She finds a worthy mate in the shipwrecked prince Ferdinand, played by Tyler Fauntleroy, as winsome here as he was in the role of the boy William in The Most Spectacularly Lamentable Trial of Miz Martha Washington at HVSF earlier this season. Together, the young lovers are as innocently playful as a pile of puppies.
Two outstanding performances come from two more of the stellar Miz Martha cast: Ralph Adriel Johnson (Sucky Boy) as a bewildered, cynical Trinculo and Britney Simpson (Ann Dandridge) as a truly enchanting, if pitiable, Ariel. Not only do the actress’ four-inch-long gold-dusted false eyelashes look hellishly uncomfortable, but the character also makes the audience root very hard for her deliverance from bondage – even more than Caliban’s. She gets to shame Prospero more than once for his scant supply of empathy, and the fairy’s influence becomes an integral part of the chiding old duke’s transformation.
Stories about righteous vengeance are a dime a dozen, offering audiences the cheap red meat they often want from popular culture. Shakespeare in his latter years had gained enough wisdom to realize that forgiveness is not only the redemptive act that makes civil society possible amongst flawed humans, but also the basis for a story that delivers lasting satisfaction. The Tempest remains widely beloved centuries after it was written for several reasons, and that is one of them.
Even if it weren’t your last chance to catch HVSF at Boscobel, it would be worth the trip — and the price of entry, ranging from $20 to $175 — to catch this show. It runs through September 4; all performances begin at 7:30 p.m. To purchase tickets, visit https://hvshakespeare.org/tickets-events. Attendees are required to provide proof of vaccination and to wear masks except when picnicking on the grounds.
Join the family! 
