Measure for Measure
Playwright: William Shakespeare. At: Goodman Theatre, 170 N. Dearborn St. Tickets: 312-443-3800; www.goodmantheatre.org; $25-$86. Runs through: April 14
Othello: The Remix
Playwright: adapted by the Q Brothers from the play by William Shakespeare. At: Chicago Shakespeare Theater at Navy Pier, 800 E. Grand . Ave. Tickets: 312-595-5600; www.chicagoshakes.com; $20-$35. Runs through: April 28
Measure for Measure ranks just behind The Merchant of Venice as the Shakespeare play most likely to make people nervous. The prospect of a romantic comedy revolving around crooked politicians, sexual harassment, out-of-wedlock pregnancies, imminent executions and resolutions relying on bedroom and jail-cell switcheroos is enough to reduce most productions to safe priggish-Angelo-vs.-spunky-Isabella scene-study exercises. For Robert Falls, however, the view is always the big picture and the spotlight always focused on the leaders responsible for societies in turmoil.
Our universe is New York City's Times Square circa 1975a conclave of brothels and strip clubs, street hustlers, drug vendors, petty thieves and the slummers who patronize their services. While the mayor is on an incognito fact-finding mission, the straitlaced Angelo is left in charge. The zealous deputy's strict application of the law sentences baby-daddy Claudio to death for the crime of fornication. The death-row convict's novice-nun sister, Isabella, petitions for his pardon, only to be told by Angelo that he will grant it in exchange for a roll in the hay. After much connivance and chicanery initiated by hizzoner-in-disguise, Claudio is spared, Angelo is punished and Isabella's virginity protected.
So all's well that ends wellright? Not according to Falls. When the people who make the law bend it to their own caprice, it doesn't matter whether or not we like those who profit thereby. No justice can come of a system rooted in corruption, however seductive its pretty lights or charming its denizens. Sure, go ahead and revel in Walt Spangler's Hieronymus Bosch-meets-Ivan Albright urban landscape and James Newcomb's charismatic doppelgangers, both civil and religious, but even as the promised happy ending appears to be unfolding right before your eyes, don't be too quick to put on your coat. In a world where appetites rule, nothing is ever ensured.
Playgoers who saw The Bomb-itty of Errors and Funk It Up Over Nothin' know what to expect when the composing team of GQ and JQ take on Shakespeare, but applying street sounds to tragedy requires tonal sophistication considerably more sensitive than the farcical-Seussical playfulness of comedy, particularly when the familiar fable is recounted in its entirety by an all-male cast of four rappers and a DJ.
Transposed from its original setting to the modern-day music industry, our story is now that of a successful recording manager gulled into homicidal despair by a jealous colleague. Assisted by Clayton Stamper's electric orchestra, Postell Pringle, Jackson Doran and the brothers Q trade off personae with protean easeeven donning drag for the roles of Bianca and Amelia, the latter of whom stops the show with a torchy rendition of "It's a Man's World." (Wisely, Desdemona is represented by only a vocal track and our imaginations.)