It’s billed as Fiasco Theater’s Pericles, not William Shakespeare’s, and there’s good reason for it. The Fiasco folks, together since 2009 and always mighty welcome, don’t mean to suggest they’re not presenting the Shakespeare play. They’re indicating they’re fooling around with it for their enjoyment and in turn for equal, if not more, audience enjoyment.
Scholars have rarely agreed that Shakespeare wrote the play himself — though with whom remains vague — and few deem it anywhere near classic Shakespeare. G. B. Harrison has claimed that Pericles is “far below his best’ and goes on to call earlier scenes as “puerile melodrama and so badly written that they might almost be parodies of Elizabethan drama at its worst.”
Heigh ho, here come the Fiasco players not — take note of this — making fun of Pericles but making fun with it. At the jovial get-go, out the nine actors stroll in similar outfits (meant to resemble muslin?) and sandals. They sit in a circle on wooden boxes and begin to sing something director-songwriter-guitarist Ben Steinfeld has wrought, enhanced by Paul L. Coffey on cello.
Truth to tell, this isn’t the first time the Fiasco members are seen. As the audience is entering, they’re spotted arranging the boxes. Some of them greet this or that one in the crowd. A few apparently spot friends whom they hug. It’s all in the spirit of establishing the informal approach to the material on hand.
What is the plot of this rarely revived play? Pericles, prince of Tyre, travels to Antioch to win the princess’ hand. He wins it, but King Antiochus doesn’t want to confer it, which prompts the imperiled Pericles to steal away. Whereupon he begins a lengthy journey around the Mediterranean that in more ways than one repeatedly leaves him all at sea.
Eventually, he marries Thaisa, and the temporarily happy couple brings infant Marina into the world. Thaisa meets a seemingly harsh end, though she actually becomes a nun. Marina grows up in a trice and is also rendered all at sea. Intended to be murdered and given out as deceased, she’s kidnapped by pirates, only to be sold to the highest bidder. She isn’t quite palmed off, but, after perils of her own, is reunited with the mourning Pericles and Thaisa so that the yet again happy family is no longer at sea.
This is Shakespeare in his Jacobean phase that includes The Winter’s Tale and The Tempest when the playwright was thinking about rebirth (cf. Hermione of The Winter’s Tale and the father-daughter bond (cf. Miranda of The Tempest). That’s when, nearing 50 and death at 52, he was focusing on the weighty oomph of redemption.
So how do the Fiasco troupers deal with all these trappings? You might call their directorial fiddling fiddle-shticks. Maybe the most refreshing is what they do with poor-put-upon Pericles. He’s played by not one, not two, not three Fiasco-ers but four: Noah Brody, Devin E. Haqq, Paco Tolson, and a sorta cross-dressing Tatiana Wechsler. The switch from Brody to Haqq has the latter moving behind the former, who then sidles behind the latter. Suave!
The company arranges it so that only one of them assumes a strictly single role. Director Steinfeld is troubadour-narrator Gower throughout, breaking into songs seemingly of his own devising, inspired by Shakespeare’s (or someone’s?) dialog.
The other eight chameleons — aided by costumer Ashley Rose Horton accessorizing — appear as several figures. Jess Austrian is Thaisa, both veiled when a nun and not when not. Coffey, Andy Grotelueschen, and Paco Tolson smoothly switch guises. All but Steinfeld appear as “and others” — you know, kidnapping pirates, et cetera.
A special word goes out to Emily Young, who’s Marina and is handed a large chunk of the lengthy, increasingly serious denouement when the forlorn young woman must talk herself out of being sold into prostitution. She brings it off by way of several speeches during a long segment. In a sequence that does impress as our Will Shakes at his quill, Marina’s twisting initially licentious Lysimachus (Tolson) around her finger is beautifully done. The same goes for the final father-daughter recognition-reconciliation, this time with Haqq as Pericles.
Reviewer’s recollection: I’ve only seen two previous Pericles productions, the first out of curiosity, the second out of duty. Subsequently, I intended to forego future opportunities. I was definitely reluctant to attend this one, until I reminded myself that the Fiasco bunch were likely to offer something appealingly off-kilter. Now I’d like to think that if I ever see another Pericles, it’s a revival of this nifty Fiasco rigmarole.
Pericles opened February 26, 2024, at the Classic Stage Company and runs through March 24. Tickets and information: classicstage.org
