SCSF puts modern twist on ‘Comedy of Errors’

PolyCentric

What happens when Antipholus meets Antipholus and Dromio meets Dromio?
The pairs look alike, so it must mean that these are sets of twins, correct?
That is exactly the case. In William Shakespeare’s “The Comedy of Errors,” a Syracusan man and his servant run into their twin brothers in the Greek city of Ephesus. When friends and families of the twins in Ephesus mistake them for the Syracuse pair, a series of wild mishaps lead to all manner of dubious outcomes – including unjust beatings, near-seduction and arrests.
The Shakespearean comedy will play out on stage this September at the Cal Poly Pomona Studio Theatre, courtesy of The Southern California Shakespeare Festival (SCSF) – a program run by Cal Poly Pomona Department of Theatre and New Dance faculty member Linda Bisesti.
Bisesti, the festival’s founder and artistic director, says that for its 13th season, SCSF will be making some modern adjustments to one of the Bard’s earliest works that will put a fresh coat of paint on a play more than 400 years old.
Taking an already bizarre story over the top, the city of Ephesus becomes Venice Beach and Syracuse changed to San Diego. The carnival-like nature of Venice Beach will be played up with a pre-show performance of circus acts that will bleed into the main performance.
Bisesti said much of the play’s reimagining stems from director Sam Robinson, who will also invert genders of the characters to place women in men’s positions, and vice versa. Antipholus becomes Anna-Maria, and Dromio becomes Darian.
“The roles are gender-bended, so the husband and wife’s roles get reexamined in terms of gendering,” Bisesti says. “Part of my belief is that Shakespeare is gender-blind and colorblind. The Elizabethans did Shakespeare with all men, and now it’s time to do it with all sorts of different people and changing ...

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