Review: Set impressive, opening not
The scenery of the theater department’s first production of the year shined on opening night. But other aspects of the play weren’t exactly polished as well as they could have been. Despite its flaws, the production entertained the Wednesday night audience and had them laughing on multiple occasions.
The storyline lends itself to a fun time. “A Midsummer Night’s Dream” is a romantic comedy. With bumbling rustics attempting to put on a play and the appearance of an ass, the comedy of the play makes as easy appearance that tickle anyone’s funny bone.
The effort put in on the set paid off. Every thing was painted in different hues of blue with white areas to represent the stars. With the right light and angle, the scenery achieves its goal: To make the audience forget about the stage and transfer them directly into the nighttime forest.
While the scenery helps the audience, the lack of period costumes (the cast is in pajamas) drew away from it.
While the actors delivered laughter to the audience, stumbles over lines resulted in awkward moments. Whether it was words falling flat or scrambling for lines in their heads, it detracted from the performance. And, like with many performances in Theatre Margot, only those seated directly in front of the stage got a good view the entire show. Otherwise, as the action moves around the stage, those at the sides are given only partial views of the performers, depending on what prop may be in the way.
Though not without some opening-night mishaps, the actors worked hard with a witty script that bound to get some hearty laughs, something we all could use.
