Falstaff of the fairway

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This article was published 27/05/2010 (5981 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

It’s safe to assume this is a first.

Loudmouth Golf, the company that makes those outrageously garish pants worn by the Norwegian curlers at the Vancouver Olympics, has just supplied a pair of trousers as a costume for a Shakespearean play.

 

The obnoxious argyle pants are worn — with a white belt, of course — over padding that gives actor David Warburton the ample paunch and hips to play one of the Bard’s greatest comedy roles: the "fat knight" Sir John Falstaff.

Being a hefty hedonist is a key part of Falstaff’s character, says the British-born local actor.

"You get the impression he would never say no to a drink — or half a chicken," says Warburton, 57. "He’s the butt of all the jokes."

Why are Falstaff and the rest of the nine-member cast decked out in disco-era golf duds and swilling 19th-hole martinis?

It’s because Shakespeare in the Ruins’ production of The Merry Wives of Windsor, on tonight through June 19 at the Assiniboine Park Conservatory, takes its inspiration from another comedy classic: the crude but much-loved 1980 movie Caddyshack.

Rodney Dangerfield’s crass, loudly dressed character in the goofy golf comedy popped into director Kevin Klassen’s head when he was thinking about present-day equivalents for the boastful, buffoonish Falstaff.

Just as Dangerfield is an outsider who’s always ogling women at the movie’s posh country club, the down-on-his-luck Falstaff is a newcomer to the town of Windsor, where he schemes to woo two married women (S.I.R. regulars Michelle Boulet and Sarah Constible) so he can siphon off their husbands’ fortunes. The gals, of course, turn the tables on him.

"The women are absolutely in control, and making jackasses out of the majority of the men," says Klassen about the play as a whole.

Klassen, 38, co-chairs the S.I.R. ensemble and is usually seen acting in the company’s shows. Making his debut here as a full-scale director, he decided to model the whole production on Caddyshack, a favourite of his since he first saw it on TV at about age 10.

A golf-course setting, he realized, would work well for a summer production that’s performed inside and outside a large tent. The 1980s costumes, with elements such as colourful sweater-vests and ascots, would be great fun. And when it comes down to it, he says, both Caddyshack and Merry Wives are "really broad, silly comedy."

"Aside from the two merry wives, there’s an equivalent character in the movie for every character in the play," he says.

"I asked (the cast) to watch the movie. (The play and movie) are structured similarly, very loose and episodic. There’s all kinds of little subplots that really don’t amount to much — except comedy — in the end. The pages and servants in the play are the caddies.

"And then, underpinning Caddyshack, and The Merry Wives of Windsor as well, is the story of two young lovers (Andrew Cecon and Charlene Van Buekenhout)."

What about Bill Murray’s character, the wild-man assistant greenskeeper who spends the movie at war with a pesky gopher?

"There is a character called Nym, one of Falstaff’s sidekicks. He’s dressed exactly like the Bill Murray character. He doesn’t play as large a role, but he’s this offbeat weirdo."

Klassen is even using pop music from 1980 to set the pre-show mood, and has worked a couple of songs from the Caddyshack soundtrack into the production.

Merry Wives is one of Shakespeare’s least-produced plays. This is the first time in 17 seasons that S.I.R. has mounted it. "As far as I know, this is the first professional production of it in Winnipeg, although I’m happy to be corrected," the director says.

Klassen has watched a BBC version of the play on video, but Warburton has never seen it in any form, despite being British himself.

Shakespeare set it in his own Elizabethan time. At full length, it contains a lot of wordplay that wouldn’t be understood by today’s audiences. S.I.R. is performing a version edited down to 100 minutes (plus an intermission), which keeps the comedy moving at an accessible clip, Klassen says.

"It’s as easy to laugh at as a well-written situation comedy. It’s almost entirely in prose, rather than verse. The dialogue is very conversational. I’ve been telling people, ‘If you know anybody who thinks they don’t like Shakespeare, bring them to this play and they’ll have a good time.’ "

Falstaff suffers humiliations such as having to dress as a woman and — in the play’s most famous scene — having to hide in a basket full of dirty laundry to escape a jealous husband.

"Shakespeare clearly wrote that for the pure ridiculousness of seeing someone who is enormous squeeze into a laundry hamper," says Warburton.

In the final prank played on Falstaff, he’s persuaded to go to the forest at night for a romantic rendezvous. Instead, he’s surrounded by children dressed as fairies, who pinch him and burn him with candles.

Klassen says audiences will have to wait and see what 1980s spin he has put on that scene. "It gets very silly," he promises.

alison.mayes@freepress.mb.ca