Summary 
Outdoor production uses music (classical versus dance beat) to augment the division between Oberon and Titania and a wrestling match to illustrate the battle between Theseus and Hippolyta. Music and sound effects enhance the show, a 25th anniversary production, with songs from Louis Armstrong to Cyndi Lauper.
Design
Directed by Karen Kessler. Set by John Stark. Costumes by Kathleen Jaremski. Lights by Julie Mack. Sound by Aaron Paolucci.
Cast
Rebecca MacLean (Titania), Scott Cummins (Oberon), Thomas Clinton Haynes (Puck), Carrie Spangler (Hippolyta), Ray Kurut (Theseus), Kathleen Logelin (Hermia), Drew Vidal (Lysander), Don Smith (Demetrius), Laura Ames (Helena), David Kortemeier (Bottom).
Analysis
Karen Kessler directs A Midsummer Night's Dream on opening night of the twenty-fifth anniversary season of the outdoor Illinois Shakespeare Festival. Kessler stages the production in traditional fashion, the set featuring a mossy green netting over the balcony to enclose the action. Four large tree trunks dominate the stage, and short branches provide green footholds for climbing and for perches. Green bushes line the perimeter, and a single yellow flower provides a splash of color at center stage.
Kessler begins the production by illustrating the conflict between Oberon and Titania. The black-clad King of the Fairies marches onstage and begins conducting classical music as his dark sprites dance ballet around him. The Queen appears in the balcony, and with a wave of her hand changes the music to a modern dance club beat. Her colorful fairies, with flowerpots balanced on their heads, take the stage and gyrate to the club music, joined by Oberon's horned and hairy sprites. The rude mechanicals strut in coordinated moves across the stage, bobbing their heads and pumping their arms. Titania applauds with glee, but the disapproving Oberon waves his hand, and the music reverts to classical strains while the dancing switches back to ballet.
Kessler furthers the fundamental battle between the sexes with the ensuing exchange between Theseus and Hippolyta. Columns of white marble slide from the beneath the stage to conceal the green bushes, and a fairy tugs the yellow flower as if from a magician's sleeve, lifting a six-pointed mat that follows the flower and spreads across the stage. The Duke and his bride then wrestle upon the mat, Theseus bare-chested and grunting, Hippolyta in a leopard-skin bikini and black kneepads. They kick and spin, throw punches and toss each other while an attendant scores the match on a blackboard.
Kessler also makes the conflict between generations apparent, with Egeus raging against Lysander and his daughter. Lysander bumps the old man as he walks past, and when Hermia kisses him his voice cracks at "a goodly percussion" like that of an adolescent. Lysander and Hermia's passion plays like a teenaged crush, and Hermia tries to hurry past their cooing with her hand covering her face. When they part, they express their anguish with an exaggerated "oh!" and blow each other kisses.
The unevenly talented ensemble is anchored by the actor portraying Bottom, just as Bottom provides leadership for the hempen homespuns. With the fairies watching from the branches on the tree trunks, he collects the actors in a sports-team huddle, and they thrust their hands into a circle amongst them, their scripts held aloft (except for scriptless Snug). They shout and break from the huddle, revealing Puck squatting with a smile in their midst.
Puck wears brown-spotted white tights and long dark hair and is at the center of much of Kessler's amiably physical comedy. Oberon "shoots" bolts at his feet to speed Puck on his way - one of numerous difficult sound effects and timing tricks - and when Puck scurries down the wrong aisle through the audience, he is "pulled" back to a rising siren sound effect, then sent by Oberon in the correct direction.
The 3.2 sequence features a slew of entertaining moments. Lovelorn Helena clings to Demetrius' leg like a spaniel, then hops after him, holding her broken shoe. Lysander vows to "perish on my sword!" but foolishly paws at an empty scabbard, and Hermia claims she may swoon with fear, then, with the back of her hand against her forehead, gives a comic "whoo!" and sways. After Oberon casts his love-in-idleness spell upon Titania - with a glowing light hidden in flower petals - the Mechanicals receive spontaneous applause as they pause their rehearsal to sadly shake their heads and watch a low-flying plane pass by. Titania concludes the first act as the fairies dance to Cyndi Lauper's "Girls Just Wanna Have Fun" while she cavorts with the ass-eared Bottom.
Helena fuels the second act with her comic desperation. She places her fingers in her ears and sings ("la la la") so as to not hear Lysander's claims of love, and when she holds her hands up to silence Demetrius and Lysander, both boys kneel and kiss her hands. When she pulls away to confront Hermia, the two find themselves cooing and kissing each other's hands. They then follow Helena on their hands and knees like loyal dogs until she turns and wags a scolding finger at them. The physical comedy provides the highlights of the production: Hermia points an accusing finger so fast that Lysander and Demetrius jerk their heads back; Hermia clings to Lysander, who spins her around him like a rag doll; the boys catch Hermia in mid-leap as she growls at Helena; Lysander and Demetrius strut cheek by jowl offstage to fight; and after Hermia pants, "You!" she and Helena circle each other like wrestlers, waggling fingers to bring the other closer.
Oberon resolves the romantic confusion in 4.1, as classical music plays amid rising blue, red, and yellow lights. As Louis Armstrong plays "Oh My Dear" and the spirits dance - "our love is here to stay" - Puck readies the stage for the Mechanicals' play, as the sprites toss pillows to him, then impishly at him. Kessler continues the physical comedy with the presentation of Pyramus and Thisby: Pyramus beats his fists against Wall hard enough to double him over, and Wall gasps in horror at "cherry lips oft kissed thy stones"; Thisby grinds an organ too slowly, so the mechanical music winds down, then blows "her" nose in the handkerchief supposedly reddened by Pyramus' blood; his/her lines regarding "Ninny's tomb" bring shouts of "Ninus!" from off stage; and when Thisby inadvertently covers the nose and mouth of the "dead" Pyramus, Bottom spasms and gasps for breath.
Kessler's lighthearted production concludes as lights in the netting glow at Oberon's command. With the Fairy King and Queen above in the gallery, the young couples flank the newlywed Duke and Duchess on stage, and Puck appears for the closing apology. As he finishes, a flash pot bursts from behind the Ewing Manor seats, and confetti rains down over the audience. Despite some missed sound cues and a scattering of lesser line-readings, Kessler's technically ambitious comedy succeeds in opening the silver-anniversary season on a jubilant note.
Note: A version of this article was edited and published in Shakespeare Bulletin, Vol. 20, No. 4, Fall 2002.