'Hamlet' the play to see; 'Cleopatra' lacks sizzle

CEDAR CITY — Three of the Bard's works are playing in the outdoor Adams Shakespearean Theatre at the Utah Shakespearean Festival.

"HAMLET," running time: three hours (one intermission).

If you have time for only one USF play this year, put "Hamlet" at the top of your list. The reason can be summed up in two words: Brian Vaughn.

He's played many leading roles here over the past dozen-plus years — comedies, musicals and dramas — but the role of Prince Hamlet is one of the theater world's most demanding, and Vaughn is more than up to the task.

The intense pain Hamlet feels over the murder of his father and the incestuous relationship between his mother and his uncle is passionate and powerful.

Director J.R. Sullivan takes an interesting approach in this production. Instead of a backdrop of the Danish seaport of Elsinore, "Hamlet" is staged as if it were being performed for a Tudor audience, with the back wall of the stage lined with decaying stucco. It's a stark metaphor for the soon-to-implode Danish monarchy.

Vaughn is backed up by some equally strong performers — Leslie Brott as Hamlet's mother, Gertrude, Ashley Smith as Laertes, Emily Trask as Ophelia and Kieran Connolly as Polonius.

Faring less successfully is Bill Christ as Claudius, Queen Gertrude's lover, who masterminds the murder of his brother, the former king. Christ's Claudius lacks the charisma you'd think would draw Gertrude to him.

But Vaughn delivers a searing, soaring performance that can only be described as unforgettable.

"THE MERRY WIVES OF WINDSOR," running time: two and one-half hours (one intermission).

Shakespeare's only spin-off is a wild romp through the villages and woods around Windsor, England, in 1600, featuring that lovable, portly womanizer Sir John Falstaff, a character first introduced in "Henry IV."

The "merry wives" are Mistress Ford and Mistress Page, who are the objects of Falstaff's misguided attention (somehow he thinks that by wooing them he can tap into their husbands' money).

Kate Buckley has directed a marvelous cast of performers adept at comedy, especially those immersed in the hilarious triangle — Leslie Brott as Mistress Ford, Victoria Adams-Zischke as Mistress Page and Kieran Connolly as rapscallion Falstaff.