As You Like It
The Nashville Shakespeare Festival performed As You Like It for their very first show in 1988. As Executive Artistic Director Denice Hicks says in her program notes, she was in the audience and “fell in love with the spirited, free, outdoor production… and now I will close out my tenure with the same romantic musical comedy that captured my heart that lifetime ago.”
Shakespeare’s plays have survived the English Civil War, the American Revolution, the American Civil War, and two World Wars (just to name a few). The joyful timelessness of As You Like It reminds us that there is more to life than stressful election years, and that laughter and comedy often reveal as many profound truths about human nature as tragedies do.
This play is a pastoral comedy Shakespeare probably wrote in 1599, around the same time as Julius Caesar. While I’m a fan of “an honorable man,” As You Like It is a lot more fun, which is probably why it’s one of his most frequently performed comedies. Like many of his comedies, this one involves disguise: after the usurping Duke Frederick banishes his daughter’s Celia’s best friend Rosalind, the two young women run away together, Rosalind disguised as a man. They hide in the forest of Arden, to which Orlando, the man Rosalind is in love with, has also fled to avoid being killed by his brother. Confusion, love, and flirting abounds and it all ends happily. This play has probably one of the most straightforward Shakespeare plots and this performance is not much longer than two hours, including the fifteen-minute intermission.
I attended the September 7th performance at OneC1TY, which was a Saturday night with perfect weather: 70 degrees when we arrived, there was a light breeze and I was able to wear a jacket comfortably for the duration of the performance (always check the forecast before attending and bring a hoodie). My friends and I sat at the back, on the low metal bleachers which provide a view over the lawn chairs and blankets of the audience closer to the stage. We forgot to bring any sort of cushion, so if you’re going to sit on the bleachers, plan accordingly.
There are food trucks and a well-stocked concession stand as well as drinks. We saw several people with the Yazoo Shake’s Beer, a delicious lager made specifically for the Nashville Shakespeare Festival. The bathrooms, or “Posh Privies,” are as convenient, clean, and posh as ever. Convenient and free garage parking is directly beside the venue, with clear signs directing drivers where to go.
Director Cammy Harris’s choice to set the play in 1950’s America is fun, providing for a variety of costumes and for a great musical beginning. The tyrant Duke Frederick sings a number on stage with a cigarette in hand, the image of a mobster crooner, while Celia and Rosalind sing backup. The mobster vibes mesh with his illegitimate power and this is added to by a bit of comedy: an actress planted in the audience pretends to film the set on her phone and is chased off by some of his thugs. What a smooth way to combine the character, the setting, and an audience reminder all in one!
Music is used frequently in this production, more diegetic than not. Often it is used to introduce a new scene, with the character appearing on stage with an acoustic guitar. One such moment gave Orlando (Gerold Oliver) a chance to demonstrate his improv skills. He came down the aisle singing and playing just as a woman attempted to dart out from her seat. Without halting his stride Oliver casually said “How ya doing” as she passed him, making everyone laugh.
As You Like It doesn’t restrict its comedy to witty dialogue but also has action: the hero Orlando fights an established wrestler in a match at Duke Frederick’s court. That scene serves as the moment that he and Rosalind fall in love at first sight, but it is also a moment for Josh Kiev to shine as his opponent Charles. Kiev hams the moment up delightfully, posturing like he’s in the WWE. Since stage wrestling between actors wearing fragile microphones already restricts the realism of physical combat, it’s clever to make the match as staged as possible.
My only critique of the show is that Duke Senior is played by a woman (Denice Hicks), but they don’t change her title to Duchess, despite referring to the character as “mother” and “she.” Actors playing characters of another gender has always been part of the Shakespearean tradition and is common for the Nashville Shakespeare Festival. Here I just wish they had done it more consistently: since there’s already another duke and they talk about the two in relation to each other, the inconsistent gendering of the role makes it more confusing at times than it needs to be.
Bethany Dinkel’s costumes are great, using looks from a variety of 1950’s social strata. One costume adds a lot of humor to the character: Jacques is a comic relief, a pretentious pseudo-intellectual in the banished Duke Senior’s court. Dinkel chose a beatnik outfit for this character, making a host of comic mannerisms available to Elyse Dawson’s portrayal.
The cast is excellent and has great chemistry with each other, especially Gerold Oliver (Orlando) and Dani Grace Nissen (Rosalind). They are charming and have such hopeful energy that you don’t even mind them falling in love at first sight, and their scenes of extensive flirting are very cute. Kate Drury does a fantastic job as the best friend Celia, teasing and supporting Rosalind as only a close friend of years could. Galen Fott owns the mobster singer role of Duke Frederick, giving him a layer of show business grime that adds to the character. Denice Hicks is authentic and likeable as Duke Senior, cheerful and uncomplaining in her rural banishment.
AG Williams gets a lot of laughs as Touchstone, and even small roles like that of Adam (played by Alan Lee) and Charles (the wrestler mentioned above, played by Josh Kiev) shine with moral strength and ostentatious ego, respectively.
The happy ending is given oomph with a musical number sung by the whole cast, The Monkees’ “I’m a Believer.” The night I attended a large part of the crowd joined in the dancing, giving us all a burst of energy.
This season’s Summer Shakespeare is Denice Hicks’ final as Executive Artistic Director for the Nashville Shakespeare Festival, after decades of service developing it into what it is today. To quote As You Like It,
“All the world’s a stage, And all the men and women merely players;They have their exits and their entrances; And one man in his time plays many parts…”
We look forward to seeing what future roles Denice Hicks will play in Nashville’s theater community. Thank you for more than thirty years of enriching our local arts scene!
The Nashville Shakespeare Company will continue their Summer Shakespeare at OneC1TY and Franklin’s Academy Park until September 29. For more information, see Summer Shakespeare 2024.
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G E Tipton was born in Nashville and raised there and in Spring Hill. She graduated from MTSU in 2017 with a degree in German and a minor in piano performance. She spent three years in Boston before returning to Nashville in 2020. She is married and has a baby boy.
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