The Best Players are asking audience-goers to suspend disbelief - albeit for a couple hours - and enter into a enchanted forest filled with young Athenian lovers, amateur actors and fairies.
Starting tonight (Wednesday), Coquitlam's Dr. Charles Best secondary is presenting A Midsummer Night's Dream, one of William Shakespeare's most popular works for the stage that continues to be performed across the world more than 400 years after he penned it.
Drama teacher Brad Case assembled some two dozen Grade 9 to 12 actors for the cast after 70 students tried out last December and, from them, he chose Grade 12ers Matthew Brown and Meghan Lenz to take on the lead roles of Oberon and Titania, the fairy king and queen.
Both 17-year-old actors had performed in past Best shows - namely, Guys and Dolls in 2010 and Government Inspector for last year's MetFest at Heritage Woods secondary - but taking on key parts in Shakespeare's masterpiece was something they never imagined.
Case said he chose the pair "because they were the best choice and mix. They act well together and I knew this would really test them."
He added, "I love the play and I like to challenge my actors every year to do things they wouldn't normally do."
Case rewrote some lines for the romantic comedy and, for time's sake, cut out a few of the longer monologues; however, for the most part, the spring play stays to its original form, with no scenes cut.
For readers unfamiliar with the somewhat complex play, A Midsummer Night's Dream tells the tale of the pending marriage between the Duke of Athens, Theseus, and the Queen of the Amazons, Hippolyta, whom he won during a battle.
As they talk about their wedding, Egeus and his daughter, Hermia, and her suitors, Lysander and Demetrius, enter. Hermia has fallen for Lysander against her father's wishes. Egeus has chosen Demetrius as his son-in-law and if Hermia doesn't wed him, she will die - a rule permitted by fathers under Athenian law. Theseus intervenes and offers a solution: Hermia can spend the rest of her life in a nunnery if she doesn't chose her fate within four days - the same date as Theseus and Hippolyta's wedding.
Lysander then hatches a plan to leave Athens with Hermia. Helena, who is in love with Demetrius, walks in and wonders how Hermia managed to capture his heart. They confide their secret with Helena, which she then shares with Demetrius, hoping he will transfer his affections.
In the meantime, a group of thespians practice a play to be performed at the wedding. They intend to meet the next night in the forest for a rehearsal, the same spot where Hermia and Lysander are to start their escape.
The action then shifts to the fairies in the forest. As they see Helena and Demetrius pass by, Oberon tells his jester, Puck - aka Robin Goodfellow - to put "love juice" in Demetrius' eyes so he falls for the first person he wakes up to.
Meanwhile, Oberon also squeezes some of the juice into his wife's eyes, hoping when she wakes up, she'll fall for a wild beast.
Unfortunately, Puck mistakes Lysander for Demetrius, and Lysander wakes up to Helena - his new desire - and Titania is awakened by Nick Bottom, one of the play's actors.
To stop the confusion, Puck reverses his spells on Lysander and Titania but he also casts a spell so none of the lovers remember what happened.
"Shakespeare is such a challenge for students but once they understand the acting, the language becomes secondary and it becomes fun," Case said.
adding, "We've invited our feeder schools to the matinees and there's so much for them to enjoy because the visuals are wonderful and the performance is fantasmic display. There's really something for everyone, no matter what age."
The Best Players' A Midsummer Night's Dream runs April 25 to 28 and May 2 to 5 at Dr. Charles Best secondary (2525 Como Lake Ave., Coquitlam). Tickets at $10/$8 are available by calling 604-461-5581. Curtain is at 7:30 p.m.
jwarren@tricitynews.com
