California Shakespeare Theater presents Life is a Dream, a modern English adaptation of Pedro Calderon de la Barca's La Vieda es Sueño (1635) by Nilo Cruz
2015-07-09
Bruns Amphitheater
100 Gateway Blvd., Orinda, CA 94563
8:00 PM, Thursday, July 9, 2015

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[8:m PM lights down, announcements]
[9:m interruption because of the rain]
[show ends 9:m PM]
[…yeah, pretty crappy notes, I know, but I didn't really feel like messing with my phone to take notes, given the wet drippy weather tonight]

• Amir Abdullah: Astolfo;
• Carlos Barrera: Ensemble;
• Tristan Cunningham: Estrella;
• Kaiso Hill: Ensemble;
• Jason Kapoor: Soldier/Ensemble;
• Julian López-Morillas: Clotaldo;
• Sarah Nina Hayon: Rosaura;
• Adrian Roberts: Basilio;
• Sean San José: Segismundo;
• Jomar Tagatac: Clarin

• Christopher Akerlind: lighting designer;
• Andrew Boyce: scenic designer;
• Stephanie Buchner: assistant lighting designer;
• Cliff Caruthers: sound designer;
• Amanda Connors: assistant director;
• Nilo Cruz: translation and adaptation of the original work, Pedro Calderon de la Barca's La Vieda es Sueño (1635);
• Sonia Fernandez: dramaturg;
• Loretta Greco: director;
• Alex Jaeger: costume designer;
• Christina Larson: production assistant;
• Dave Maier: resident fight director;
• Megan Sada: stage manager;
• Deborah Sussel: voice and text coach;
• Morgen Warner: associate costume designer.

So I put this gig on our social calendar for a number of reasons. First of all was the invitational postcard we got in the mail, which piqued my interest on account of the photo of Sean San José as Segismundo, and the mention of Loretta Greco as director. Having experienced their collaborations at the Magic Theatre in several productions over the past few years (in Se Llama Cristina, for example), I was certainly curious to know what they were up to now! And had I not been alerted to the production, I probably wouldn't have noticed when it popped up in the Goldstar discount list. Even more surprising was that we had a free night that matched the discount choices from Goldstar. Sometimes, you gotta recognize that it's time to take the leap, then close your eyes and jump!

I dimly recall a prior visit to Bruns Amphitheater some ten or twenty years ago, and shivering in the cold as the fog rolled in and the Shakespeare unfolded (probably Love's Labor Lost or another of the comedies), but apparently whatever discomfort I experienced then didn't set me permanently against the notion of seeing a performance at the same venue, and I'm absolutely positive that we were experiencing an unseemly heat wave when I ordered my tickets for this performance of Life Is a Dream.

So off we went, undaunted by the prospect of rain, despite a day of dreary, drippy weather, punctuated by showers. Foolish mortals! Far smarter would we have been to have heeded the obvious and dressed appropriately for a damp evening. Somehow, the incongruity of rain in July was just too much – I refused to believe that the reality before my eyes was possible – and so we prepared for the bad (a cold and clammy night), rather than the worst (honest-to-God rain). I must have been dreaming!

Anyways, while the weather was obviously discomfitting to both the performers and the audience, we all suffered together, and in the end, I'm glad I attended, even if the play wasn't really all that strong. Maybe it made more sense during the Inquisitorial period in Span when it was written, but my summary evaluation is that the plot is unnecessarily convoluted, and the dramatic action served only to obscure the basic philosophical conundrum at the heart of the work. Is life a dream? How can we know? Should we care?

I can say that I definitely got wet. Next time I visit Bruns I'm going to pay more attention to the weather forecast!

Back to the previous event! ☸ Up to the 2015 yearbox! ☸ Up to the 2015 event list! ☸ On to the next event!