These shows are no turkeys

Thanksgiving is great, but what are your plans for the rest of the weekend? Even during a downturn the stores on Black Friday will probably be forbidding. Why not go to the theater instead? Underground Railway Theater is presenting "Einstein's Dreams" at Central Square Theater. I haven't seen it yet myself, but the production got a great review in the Herald, and from a critic who is notoriously critical, at that. Check it:

Lightman’s poetic language, Savick’s sense of play, and the actors’ buoyancy come together to form a project that’s frantic as it is dazzling. “Einstein’s Dreams” is a rare perfect storm touching down in the tenuous border between science and art.

You can't get better than that. I've seen all three actors before (Robert Najarian, Debra Wise, and Steven Barkhimer) and they're full of sparkle and juice. Just the thing for a brisk early-winter's day.

If death and politics didn't make your Thanksgiving dinner conversation awkward enough, how about a nice dose of unrestrained capitalism and anti-Semitism? Actors' Shakespeare Project is tackling "Merchant of Venice," which Mr. Improbable and I did see last weekend. Go. For one thing, they are offering a $10 discount for this weekend's performances--get your tickets here and use the code "THANKSG." It's such a deal!

And deals are, of course, at the heart of the play. The Globe did an excellent pre-production article about the show, which attracted the following comment:

Who is the Merchant of Venice? Antonio, Shylock, Portia, or maybe Bassanio? We might ask who has the money? Who has the power?

Of course, Antonio is "really" the merchant, which makes that a nice gotcha trivia question (ask most people who the merchant in MoV is and they'll say Shylock). But metaphorically, the commenter is right, everyone is the merchant. Venice and Belmont are rich cities where everyone still teeters on the edge of bankruptcy (sound familiar?), where there is always a deal to be cut, an angle to be played, a world reminiscent of Elvis Costello's corrosive "This Town":

Mr. Getgood moved up to Self-Made Man Row / Though he swears that he's the salt of the earth / He's so proud of the "kick-me-hard" sign / That they hung on his back at birth. / He said I appreciate beauty, / If I have one, it is my fault / Beauty is on my pillow, beauty is there in my vault

And what about Venice's Mr. Getgood, Shylock, a man born with a very real "kick-me-hard" sign on his back? Jeremy Kissel is nothing short of amazing in the role. His Shylock is so real, so natural, that a couple of times during the performance I honestly thought he had gone off book and started improvising. His command of the language is that natural, that immediate.

Shylock: Villain or Victim? is a nice topic for an undergraduate English paper. Mr. Kissel and director Melia Bensussen--both Jewish--aren't writing a term paper, though, and their answer is: neither. Shylock is a worthy adversary, nothing less. I saw the 1998 ART production with Will LeBow, and found the trial scene so hard to watch that I literally became nauseated. When the judge decreed that Shylock must convert, Mr. LeBow let out this ungodly scream of a man utterly destroyed--they placed the crucifix around his neck and my stomach lurched.

Mr. Kissel, in the same scene, merely shrugged. Fine. "Convert" me. You won this round. But I'm not going anywhere, and you know and I know I'll always be a Jew. And you know I will never give up. You can't pity him, as you could Mr. LeBow's Shylock. It would be like feeling sorry for Rahm Emanuel. He lives for this battle.

Of course, "Merchant" is a comedy, not an After-School Special about how the oppressed can become the oppressors. (Which Shylock is; you can see why Jessica runs away. He's a horrible, Vic Mackey-style father. Not one for being a good advertisement for his beliefs is our Shylock.) And ASP, as always, does the comedy right. The final scenes are ringingly funny,* and the genuine love and friendship between Portia, Bassanio, Nerissa, and Grazanio are real and delightful. Portia and Nerissa's scenes, in particular, are almost alarmingly modern. Shakespeare wrote female friendship so well: the way we flatter and bolster each other, complain about men, hatch plans and tricks, mimic the annoying people we have to deal with every day, make fun of ourselves and each other, show off and self-deprecate. Carrie & Co. have nothing on Portia and Nerissa, swanning around in their retro dresses and bare legs, clutching stems of wine, clueless and classist and well-meaning and loyal.

*Oooh, bad unintentional pun, there.