‘All’s Well’ at last

SAN DIEGO —  Consider this a friendly public service announcement from a concerned theater critic: Please, unless there’s a truly compelling reason, let’s agree to a moratorium on revivals of “Hamlet,” “Romeo and Juliet” and (on pain of death!) “Twelfth Night.” Exceptions will be made for brilliant actors and directors, but really, people, if you love Shakespeare that much, you should know that life is but a brief candle and there are a lot of other plays we should sample before that light goes out!

Which brings me to Darko Tresnjak’s enthralling staging of “All’s Well That Ends Well,” which kicked off the Old Globe’s 2008 Summer Shakespeare Festival at the outdoor Lowell Davies Festival Theatre on Saturday. There are many reasons to catch this beautifully spoken, lucidly laid out tragicomedy, but the one that appeals to me most is the chance to encounter a story that isn’t performed at every turn. Hey, it’s not every day I get to write a Shakespeare review and have to worry about spoilers.

Technically, this is one of Shakespeare’s late comedies, but the work has been labeled a “problem play” by scholars, and not simply because it deals with a thorny social issue. A fairy tale burdened or enhanced (depending on your view) with more than the usual realistic psychology, “All’s Well That Ends Well” defies easy categorization and may share more with Shakespeare’s romances, which have no trouble integrating darker strains in epic sagas that end on a tremulous note of hope.

The story, which harks back to an episode in Boccaccio’s “Decameron,” revolves around Helena (Kimberly Parker Green), a poor gentlewoman living at the home of the Countess of Rossillion (Kandis Chappell). This orphaned daughter of a renowned doctor has fallen in love with Bertram (Graham Hamilton), the countess’ caddish son, who wants to leave his French backwater and make a name for himself as a warrior and lover.

Helena, who’s of noble character but of low social standing, doesn’t hold out much hope for the match until a report comes back concerning Bertram’s visit to the ailing French king (James R. Winker). She has inherited prescriptions from her father that will allow her to cure the good monarch’s ravaging illness. After getting the countess’ permission to travel to Paris, she works a miracle on the king and in return gets the right to choose her husband, no matter if his station is significantly higher than her own.

Bertram, the lucky man, can hardly believe that he’s being saddled with a woman he’s looked to as a kind of sibling-servant. Influenced by the morally unsavory Parolles (Bruce Turk), a braggart spider continually spinning sophistic webs, Bertram decides to head off to the Florentine wars after consenting to a nominal marriage. It’s is up to Helena -- a protagonist with an adventurous intelligence not unlike Rosalind’s in “As You Like It” -- to become more than “the shadow of a wife.”

Possessing “the name, and not the thing” is obviously a cause of great pain to Helena. And this theme is intricately pursued by Shakespeare, who seizes every opportunity to point out gaps between words and facts, appearance and actuality. The world of the play is one in which real value is often misprized. Helena is far superior to Bertram in every regard except pedigree (even the countess knows this to be the case, which is why she doesn’t object to their marriage). Yet she will have to prove her worth to him, even as he repeatedly proves his worthlessness to her.

The proverbial title drips with irony, though Tresnjak takes a surprisingly rosy approach to a work whose modern-day attraction has rested in its sinister undercurrents. Perhaps his interpretation has been informed by the overriding motif of “love and family,” which Tresnjak says in a program note links “All’s Well That Ends Well” to the Old Globe’s two other Shakespeare festival offerings, “Romeo and Juliet” and “The Merry Wives of Windsor.”

In any case, the production goes easy on Bertram, who’s portrayed by Hamilton as more of a callow youth than a serial liar, lecher and fraud. If it weren’t for the countess’ baleful glances at her son, we might still be questioning whether his union with Helena is really in the genteel lad’s best interest.

Fortunately, the romantic softness isn’t particularly damaging, as the text is so clearly articulated that perspectives more bitter than sweet aren’t ruled out. Tresnjak gives Shakespeare’s language enough room to resonate beyond the genial directorial framework, and the storytelling has an assured glow as it pliantly unfolds on Ralph Funicello’s paneled sets.

Taken as a whole, the players deliver measured performances, which show as much respect for the inner lives of the characters as the machinations of plot.

With her petite spectacles and somber attire, Green’s calculating though always sympathetic Helena looks like an attractive librarian who’s concealing the lioness within. Her occasional sobbing outbursts are unnecessary, but the refreshing seriousness of her demeanor allows us to accept that the desire to ensnare Bertram isn’t completely cuckoo.

Of course, one of the ways in which we judge a character is by the company he keeps. And the ensemble helps us sort out the discrepancy between the solid old values represented by the countess, king and royal aristocrats and the cynical new wave headed by Parolles, whose eventual comeuppance is captured by Turk with an ennobling agony.

Helena’s mission isn’t merely to rope herself a rich husband but to reconnect him to the honorable tradition he has fallen away from. Whether Bertram deserves his busy, far-seeing bride is another story.

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