‘The Merchant of Venice’
Print Edition
SHYLOCK’S cries for a pound of flesh have made him one of theater’s most memorable villains, but Tony award-winning actor Jonathan Pryce plays him as a more sympathetic character than the one victimized by his Christian adversaries in Shakespeare’s “The Merchant of Venice.”
Brought by the Royal Shakespeare Company (RSC) to the Shanghai Oriental Art Center from London’s Globe Theater as part of the celebrations honoring the 400th anniversary of Shakespeare’s death, director Jonathan Munby takes a play conventionally balanced between humor and pathos and transforms it into a deeper, brooding production that is uncannily attuned to current world troubles.
The play opens on a jovial note with masked actors dancing around the stage but this merriment is disturbingly interrupted by two Jewish passers-by being brutally attacked and thrown to the ground. It is here the audience apprehends that despite its classification as a comedy, this production of “The Merchant of Venice” embarks on an untraditionally dark trajectory.
This atmosphere is reflected in a set dominated by dark, carved wooden walls that let in little light. Eerily beautiful and often shrouded in smoke, the stage further augments this interpretation of the play. It is serious and intended to send powerful messages to the audience, but not to entertain.
As a result comedic scenes are few and far between but nonetheless well performed and consistently engaging. Launcelot Gobbo (Stefan Adegbola) is the source of the most laughs, inviting two audience members onstage to embody his debate about whether or not to leave Shylock, his master. The heightened appeal of this scene to the Chinese-dominated audience lies in Adegbola’s (albeit rudimentary) use of Mandarin during his monologue, soliciting plenty of laughter from the spectators.
Much of the remaining humor of the play, however, is lost in the character of Portia. The domineering heiress, played by Rachel Pickup, is as strong and wily as befits a heroine and gives a passionate deliverance of her speech at Antonio’s trial but rarely reveals a warm personality, leaving the romantic comedy of the play as almost an afterthought. Even the scene in which Portia and Nerissa demand to see the rings they previously bestowed upon their husbands lacks any hint of flirtatiousness — instead the way in which the women toy with their spouses seems tinged with teasing malice.
Intentionally or not, the themes explored in this production of “The Merchant of Venice” may resonate more than ever with audiences, particularly given the xenophobic underpinning of the recent Brexit vote and Donald Trump’s anti-immigrant election invective.
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