Change And Controversy At Oregon Shakespeare Fest -- Appointment Of Dynamic New Director Offset By Charges That One Production Contains Symbols Of Anti-Semitism

ASHLAND, Ore. - Visitors at this summer's Oregon Shakespeare Festival are buzzing about two topics - one upbeat, the other darker.

The brighter subject is the appointment of actor Henry Woronicz to succeed the Festival's retired artistic director, Jerry Turner. Playgoers are asking, will he change the festival's conservative tradition? The answer seems to be a firm yes and no.

Woronicz says of the OSF, "It isn't broke, so it doesn't need to be fixed. But the failures we have aren't as interesting as they might be."

He explained that he plans to continue traditional presentations of Shakespeare plays in OSF's Elizabethan theater, but hopes to broaden the range of contemporary plays presented in the Angus Bowmer and Black Swan theaters, including possible presentation of an original script each year.

He wants to extend the repertoire to plays by South African playwright Athol Fugard, and by authors such as Samuel Beckett, Luigi Pirandello, Eugene Ionesco, and Jean Genet.

Although Woronicz, 36, has less directing experience than some other contenders for his post, his skill is certain. This summer, he directed Jerry Sterner's 1987 play, "Other People's Money," a show so popular we were unable to get tickets during a recent visit to Ashland. Woronicz also stars as Petruchio in this summer's production of Shakespeare's "The Taming of the Shrew."

"Actors are the great unused resource in theaters," Woronicz said. "Most theater companies don't take full advantage of their creative talent." He will stress providing actors with time and opportunity to explore their creative range.

The darker topic at Ashland this year concerns the alleged anti-Semitism in the modern-dress production of Shakespeare's "The Merchant of Venice." A student rabbi leveled the anti-Semitism charge shortly after the show's opening last April, saying, "The director purposely desecrates Jewish objects which are not called for in the script."

Defending her interpretation at a symposium convened to thrash out the question, Libby Appel, the show's director, said she intended to disturb audiences with the play's bigotry, but that the play is anti-other rather than anti-Semitic.

Last week, we attended the play with an open mind, and came away agreeing with critics. When the Jew at the play's center is depicted as cruel and demented, when he is ridiculed and reviled, and his tormentors are portrayed as the "good guys" who triumph in the end - stripping him of all he owns including his only child, and in the end forcing him to convert to Christianity - that seems pretty clearly anti-Semitic.

The festival's deliberate search for a Jewish director, Appel, has resulted only in bringing in more overt symbols of Jewishness. Particularly offensive is the cloth blazoned with a gold Star of David and Hebrew lettering which is wrapped around a scale Shylock brings to court to weigh the pound of flesh he hopes to cut from the heart of a debtor who has reviled him.

Todd Silverstein, writing for the Medford Mail Tribune, said, "Together with last year's `God's Country,' this makes two (OSF) plays in two years that racists could attend feeling very good about what they see up on the stage."

The play works easily in modern dress, save for the inexplicable costuming of the maidenly Portia in a style suggestive of a Hollywood harlot perpetually dressed for a gala evening at which she might hope to outstrip Cher.

Another question mark in this summer's productions is Shakespeare's "Julius Caesar," tarted up with heavy doses of sooth-saying with bloody entrails, and a giant broken head and hand plunked down on the Elizabethan stage, symbolizing the death of Caesar. It's all very heavy-handed, a concept blown into a gimmick which doesn't quite come off.

High marks go to "Major Barbara" by Bernard Shaw, directed by Jerry Turner. It's one of the brightest spots in this summer's line-up. Shaw's witty, acerbic defense of munitions manufacture seems particularly timely in the aftermath of Operation Desert Storm.

In addition to the plays already mentioned, this summer's productions include Shakespeare's "Henry VI, Part I"; "Our Town" by Thornton Wilder, "Woman in Mind" by Alan Ayckbourn, "Some Americans Abroad" by Richard Nelson, and "Two Rooms" by Lee Blessing. The season continues through Oct. 27.

Information is available from the Oregon Shakespeare Festival, P.O. Box 158, Ashland, OR 97520. To order tickets, call the box office at (503) 482-4331. Attendance at OSF this season is running 89 percent, three percent ahead of last year, despite the slowed economy.