Dream lovers Fools rule in 2nd Story’s Midsummer Night BY BILL RODRIGUEZ

It’s déjà vu all over again, and not just because it wouldn’t be summer without a production or few of Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream. Bob Colonna helmed the Rhode Island Shakespeare Theater (TRIST) in Newport for 19 years, until its foundering in 1990, and the former Trinity Rep actor is once again ringmastering a romp of the Bard’s.

The stage this time around is 2nd Story Theater (through July 17), which is entering its fifth year in Warren with the first play not directed by artistic director Ed Shea.

In proper celebratory mode, the playwright’s most popular comedy has been chosen, tryst rather than tristesse, and gussied up in carnival finery. Two couples flee to the woods to escape the real world, only to find that their dream life has been tampered with by puckish fairies in order to confuse them about who they really are and what they really want.

The modern-day reference point is the films of Federico Fellini, such as 81/2, populated by bizarrely dressed denizens. (That is a bit of a thematic stretch, since the setting is ancient Greece rather than the Italy of many Shakespeare plays, but pinpointing the festive tone successfully trumps geography.)

The backdrop to all the action is a quote by Fellini: "There is nothing more true than a dream," which is emblazoned silent-movie style, framed by a shaky line of marquee lights. As the prologue is recited by Puck, forest fairies and other colorful characters mill and gabble, sporting the imaginative costume design by Ron Cesario, full of feathers, metallic lamé, and Garboesque women’s hats.

But perhaps the most delightful visual effect is that the sprightly Puck is portrayed by Marilyn Meardon, a lively septuagenarian whose presence reminds us that Puck and his mischievous spirit is timeless and thereby ageless.

Another first for 2nd Story is a more conventional stage than its usual intersecting walkways, which have served to put the activity in our midst. Platforms at the back and a lower area thrust into the audience allow the wide-shot action to take place away from us and the close-ups to be viewed with us on three sides.

The comical-looking characters we first see en masse step out of that opening comic book tableau one by one and into three-dimensionality, of an archetypical sort. The greaser we saw slouching about in a hairnet, cigarette dangling, is pretty boy Demetrius, played by Will Jamison with early Brando ("Stel-laaaa!) nasality and late Homer Simpson vacuity. Though Helena (Christin Goff) loves Demetrius, he is pledged and loyal to Hermia (Amy Thompson). But Hermia is in love with Lysander, whom Ryan Maxwell starts out giving an over-the-top sniveling wussitude. That makes his later fairy-inspired transformation — necktie into headband, high-pitched voice to Rambo range, nerd into ninja — a very funny parallel to love-maddened personality changes we’ve all stifled giggles at witnessing in real life. Lysander switches allegiance to Helena in a pixie-dust misfire. Thompson and Goff are both feisty fun as the baffled, and eventually sparring, young women.

Fairy king Oberon (Vince Petronio) and fairy queen Tatania (Carol Schlink) enjoy playing tricks on these mortals, but even more fun is had by a group of amateur actors who get to play before Theseus (Jim Sullivan), the Duke of Athens, and his court. The troupe of "rude mechanicals" — a tinker, a joiner, and other tradesmen — are ostensibly directed by "good sister Quince" (Joan Dillenback, dressed as — get it? — a nun). But rehearsal of the play within a play is taken over with whirlwind exuberance by Bottom the weaver (Tom Roberts). He eagerly demonstrates how he would perform every role mentioned, even those who exchange dialogue. Bottom is the role that can provide the most delight in this comedy, as long as the farce isn’t forced. Roberts ably finds enough variations on ooh-ooh enthusiasm to keep the one-note character from sounding repetitious.

Director Colonna has skillfully shaped these characterizations, although it’s often difficult to separate what the director suggested from what the actor came up with. One likely example of the attentive Colonna touch is when Lysander’s iambic pentameter waxes purple in self-impressed verbiage for a while before his attention abruptly returns to Earth and the information he’s imparting.

"What fools these mortals be," Puck observes in delight at one point. This charming interpretation at 2nd Story Theater gets us to nod in bemused agreement even as we recognize that the jibe is aptly directed toward us all.