Credit Two Gentlemen of Verona as being Shakespeare's earliest comedy, and its debits (e.g., silliness, excessive punning, one unsympathetic hero) aren't dire. With so many literary sources and reliance on Elizabethan manners, morals, motifs, it's a wonder it's so neatly structured. The leads are the two young men of the title and the two women with whom they'll make two couples. There are two observant servants, two fathers who dictate to their sons, and two clowns. Note that one of the women cross-dresses, one of the men is saved from danger by outlaws to live in a forest, and there's an "Italianate" type of suitor.
Also rings both symbolize and identify; romance proceeds along the rules of courtly love. It seems Shakespeare was trying out elements he'd use in later plays. He played here too with denoting character status through dialogue in poetry or prose, and "Who Is Silvia?" is a forerunner of songs to come.
Nothing essential changes as resourceful director Greg Leaming shifts time to today and Verona to a mod club scene. When we meet the hot young swingers, they might as well be performing "Dirty Dancing." (And they do it so well, thanks to choreographer Jimmy Hoskins.) The guys are in jeans; the gals in minis, moving on straps-over-soles with stiletto heels. Valentine wows them (as Benjamin Boucvalt thus does us) on entering. It's his last fling before dad sends him to Milan to acquire gentlemanly ways at the ducal court. (Dad is Tony Stopperan's aristocratic businessman "aided" by Summer Dawn Wallace's Pantina, a Marilyn-Monroe type with Joisey accent.)
Valentine's best friend Proteus would gladly go along. He's in love though, and for fear of losing Julia, lets Valentine leave solo. To her maid Concetta (perceptive Ashley Scallon) Julia pretends she doesn't care for Proteus or the love letter he's sent. Yet these traditional "courtly lovers" are soon exchanging rings of fidelity. And almost as soon, Proteus' dad sends him off to join his friend. He's accompanied by his skateboarding servant Speed (Jake Staley, spry in speech and motion, a clown).
Valentine, meanwhile, has fallen for the duke's daughter, Silvia. And vice-versa. (The gals, played winningly by cute Megan Delay and striking Katie Cunningham each win our sympathy. We're less fond of Joshua Schubart's rightly bossy duke.)
Because the Duke wants Silvia to marry the rich but foppish Turio (Geoff Knox, funny but with often undecipherable mushmouth accent), Valentine has to leave. Luckily, he's taken in by forest outlaw bikers (notably, grizzly Stopperan, doubling) and made their chief. Instead of finding him in Milan, then, Proteus sees Silvia. He's smitten by her! What won't he do against his friend and Julia? Wait! Isn't he sort of attracted, as well, to his new servant Sebastian?
We pity poor Julia. We also know she's come in disguise as Sebastian. With the honorable knight Eglamour (a staid Luke Bartholomew) to assist, Silvia escapes. Though she's captured by outlaws, we know all will turn out in a gentleman-like manner. It's fun to watch happen here!
As Proteus is a troublesome hero, Jon-Michael Miller has to works to make flip-flopping of loves and honor acceptable to us. He mostly succeeds. We might wish Proteus to come over finally as a bit more contrite. Though he's the play's central character, the clown Lance (off-beat, unflappable Gretchen Porro) with faithful dog Crab (played with distinction by Roscoe on opening night) steal the show. Porro not only puts over some difficult parody and supplies comic relief when things look chancey for the heroines. She also adapts Crab's behavior to their relationship and her lines.
The traditional dance at the end returns us happily to comedy after a somewhat harrowing last scene. Through director Leaming's modernized, near-perfect interpretation, a less than perfect play seduces.
