The Big Shakespeare Set Switcheroo

TIM BROWN IN THE YALE SUMMER CABARET SHAKESPEARE FESTIVAL PRODUCTION OF THE TEMPEST. PHOTO BY ETHAN HEARD.
This is where it starts getting interesting.
The Yale Summer Cabaret production of The Tempest kicked off what, with the subsequent openings of As You Like It and YSC artistic director Devin Brain’s original aggregation of several “Henry” and “Richard” plays, Rose-Mark’d Queen, a logistically complex three-show repertory season of Shakespeare in the small student-run basement theater space. There’s a rotating sched of performances through mid-August.
Veteran summer stock performers may sniff at this exertion—a few decades ago, rep seasons were the very definition of summer theater. Most of the young talents at the Summer Cabaret even have recent experience in multi-show machinations, having just survived the latest Carlotta Festival of New Plays at the Yale School of Drama. But the Yale Cabaret, with its small ceilings and confined quarters (allowing not much more than 60 seats for the audience) is a special case.
The Tempest features an abtract set of metal poles and branches on which the actors (particularly Ariel) spin and clamber. It would not be out of line to suppose that the set jungle gym would suffice for the other two Shakespeare shows.
This is not, however, the case, due to a switch in designers during the production process and the needs of the three disparate directors.
One constant—not just for this singular three-pronged “Shakespeare Festival” season but for the past four Yale Summer Cabaret seasons in general—is music director Nathan Roberts. The composer/performer anchored the onstage bands behind the Cabaret productions of Hedwig and the Angry Inch, The Who’s Tommy and the original musical Fly-By-Night. He once wandered through a contemporary play at the Cabaret as a wandering minstrel singing ‘80s pop songs.
Nathan Roberts had his work cut out for him on The Tempest, having to prepare immortal melodies which are roundly praised by the characters in the show. Not that comedy scores or marching songs are any easier.
Doing The Tempest first might have psychologically eased the anxiety over the impending set-and-script transitions for the acting company: In the SumCab’s production, everybody gets to do pieces of Prospero’s role.