Hail Caesar

Trinity takes Shakespeare on the road

by Bill Rodriguez

JULIUS CAESAR. By William Shakespeare. Directed by Amanda Dehnert. With Joy Besozzi, Mark Sutch, Jay Bragan, and Stephen Wolfert. Presented by the Trinity Summer Shakespeare Project through August 20.

Some Shakespeare is perfect for outdoor performing. A Midsummer Night's Dream in a woodsy park, The Tempest during a well-timed downpour. And Julius Caesar in an amphitheater, with its speeches to Roman mobs. Amphitheaters such as Providence's Waterplace Park, where Trinity Conservatory students are performing a high-energy rendition several times this summer, directed by Amanda Dehnert.

I caught it on the semi-circle of steps at Veterans Memorial Park in Pawtucket, where it built into an affecting tragedy, traffic behind us and birds above us fading quite away. That's the strength of Julius Caesar. It's such a muscular play, with action straining at the leash when its hot-headed characters are not running rampant.

The reign of Caesar as military leader ended the Republic of Rome in 49 BC After five years of being appointed dictator by a compliant senate for short periods, he was finally named dictator for life. That year he was assassinated. Shakespeare condenses this sequence, opening with citizens celebrating his military victory over Pompey, with whom he had shared leadership, and placing the assassination in the immediate aftermath. The bard also rewrites history by having Caesar publicly turn down an emperor's crown three times, inflaming the crowd's loyalty, instead of being the power-grabber that he became. Director Oliver Stone, fabulist of political biopics, is in good company, unfortunately.

This Trinity production not only boils the story down to less than 90 minutes, it maintains the through line of passion and violence by stylized visual simplicity: no sets or props -- except bamboo staves for weapons -- and all are dressed in white, with red sashes reminding us of imminent hot-headedness and bloodshed.

Julius Caesar has endured because it is about timeless relationships rather than just plot. To underscore that here, Caesar is played by a woman. Joy Besozzi commands the stage with controlled intensity of feeling instead of testosterone. By the time the Ides of March rolls around and Caesar is stabbed to death by conspiring senators, Besozzi has grounded the scene in introspective gravitas that is quite moving.

Caesar's loyal lieutenant Mark Anthony (Jay Bragan) weaves in and out of the play, oblivious of danger before the killing, cannily self-protective afterwards. Bragan's most believable scene was Mark Anthony's post-murder soliloquy. So it was surprising how rushed and affectless his crucial "I have come to bury Caesar, not to praise him" speech was soon afterwards.

The largest psychological presence is that of Brutus (Mark Sutch), who agonizes about doing the right thing for Rome before and after the "Et tu, Brute?" accusation. Brutus is a military man, not a brooding Hamlet, so by nature self-doubt will not hamper what he sees as duty. Sutch strikes a skillful balance between obligation and remorse.

Prodding Brutus's civil responsibility is the self-serving Cassius (Stephen Wolfert), he of the untrustworthy "lean and hungry look," as Caesar observes. Wolfert's best scene is a late one, where Cassius's feelings are hurt by Brutus, who questions his loyalty as a friend. Among other roles well performed, as Brutus's wife Portia, Laura Ames is convincing and captivating from her first lines. I wished she'd had a larger role.

Such a pared-down production is challenging to make work. There are no big-budget distractions or period-theme costumes to entertain us. Here the visual simplicity worked well, the red sashes and ribbons unspooling like streams of blood. As stylized and as right on were the fight scenes designed by Craig Handel, the choreographed clacks of staffs replacing literal sword play. The production could have, should have, slowed down its finger-popping pace in more scenes, to allow us a few more stepping stones, resting places for us and characters to breath deeply and absorb the significance of the antic action. But the up side to such a breathless staging is that we don't drop our attention for a minute.

The Trinity students will be performing Julius Caesar at various outdoor locations, from Foster to UMass, Dartmouth, through August 20. A similar tour of The Taming of the Shrew will begin July 8. For a schedule, call 521-1100, and check our listings.