Timothy Edward Kane and Tracy Michelle Arnold/Photo: Liz Lauren
RECOMMENDED
Throughout Gary Griffin’s absorbing two-hour and twenty-minute production, Philip S. Rosenberg’s lights and Mike Tutaj’s projections coordinate with Mara Blumenfeld’s costumes to create an arresting wash of lush purples and oranges, working as much dreamy magic on the audience as Timothy Edward Kane’s gleeful fairy king Oberon and Elizabeth Ledo’s gender-bending Puck work on the four young lovers in the forest.
A slight script reordering gives the rude mechanicals, led by the swaggering Bottom (an instantly likeable Ron Orbach), more prominence by introducing them before the members of the court, and turning the scrappy troupe of actors into a musical group allows harmonized singing and instrumentation to raise the profile of the final “so bad it’s good” play within a play so that it’s clear why the duke enjoys it so much. Opening and closing nods to Freud feel somewhat shoe-horned in, but work nicely as bookends. (Zach Freeman)
Chicago Shakespeare Theater, 800 East Grand (at Navy Pier), (312)595-5600. Through April 8.
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