By Brendan Barnes, Staff Writer

Of all the places and times that lend themselves to Shakespeare’s protean comedy “Twelfth Night,” 19th century post-bellum Georgia seems to be the strangest choice. However, as the play unfolds, director Peter Sander’s decision begins to make more and more sense. The isolation of the play’s setting – an “imaginary island…somewhere near the coast of Georgia” — is an echo of Shakespeare’s Illyria, an isolated yet charming land that is at once ostensibly aloof and still surprisingly informed about the world outside. This almost paradoxical nature of the play’s setting is an integral facet of Sander’s production, as foreign characters come and go in Illyria’s remote position. With such limits on geographical fluidity, characters are more easily and fully fleshed out, making Sander’s production of “Twelfth Night” depend on its actors — rather than its Shakespearean pedigree — to bring it to life.

After the play opens with Duke Orsino’s famous “If music be the food of love…” speech, we meet the shipwrecked Viola (Maya de Bresser) who believes her twin brother, Sebastian, has drowned in the same wreck. Deciding her best option lies in dressing as a young man, Viola enters Orsino’s service as a page named Cesario. Almost immediately, Orsino employs Cesario to woo the mourning countess Olivia (played by Chelsea Whitfield.) As expected, Viola’s cross-dressing creates some awkward moments with the duke, especially once Viola begins to fall in love with him and Olivia falls in love with Cesario. De Bresser falters at the low points of the play but is at her best when she is pushed and pulled by her love and her lover. With careful subtlety, Whitfield smoothly guides Lady Olivia from a haughty, self-concerned lady to an almost childish moonstruck lover.

Balancing out the pangs of love and despair are the members of Olivia’s household. Ian Poake delivers a performance full of stomach as Olivia’s often drunk uncle, Toby Belch. Keith Pinault brings the “puritanical” Malvolio to the fore, transforming the irritable steward into someone you just love to hate. However, Michael Guess steals all of his scenes as the bumbling idiot, Sir Andrew Aguecheek. Nearly everything he does, from talking to walking is guaranteed to make even the more academically-inclined audience members crack a smile. Feste, the ringleader of the group and main rival of Malvolio, is handled well by Chris Balestriere; armed with a guitar and a sharp wit, Feste makes a comical hell for Malvolio – but entertainment for the audience – with words and song.

However, the decision to set the play in Georgia does, too, have its setbacks: namely the dialect. Throughout the play, Southern drawl slips in and out, sometimes bordering on southern British. And even though the dialect enhances the comedic effect the actors can utilize, it also has the effect of making the characters seem like caricatures.   
And for all the laughs, the generally light-hearted approach that Sander takes with the play does not make the production perfect.

In all the humor, Antonio and Sebastian’s more complicated relationship takes a backseat to Viola and Orsino’s, while Feste’s intense personal feud with Malvolio is only explained through the fool’s — in the Shakespearian sense — relationship with the comical, yet simple, Sir Toby and Sir Andrew.

And while “Twelfth Night” is classified as a ‘comedy,’ there is the element of sadness in the original play that makes it that much fuller. Sander’s production hints at this complexity from time to time, but, more often than not, favors making the audience laugh rather than reflect. Ironically — but fittingly — it is Feste, whose name means celebration, who notices the element of sadness hidden in all the laughter. Balestriere ends the play with his strongest performance, singing: “The rain, it raineth every day…”
 

Michael Guess as Sir Andrew Aguecheek and Ian Poake as Sir Toby Belch in Peter Sander’s post-Civil War-set production of “Twelfth Night.” (Sean M. Gates/The Chronicle)