Morgue the merrier: Isabella brings the bard's Measure for Measure to life.

Much Ado About Rotting

Pig Iron's zombie Shakespeare is compelling.

by J. Cooper Robb

It’d be misleading to categorize Pig Iron Theatre Company’s startling new work Isabella at the Live Arts Festival as an adaptation of Shakespeare’s Measure for Measure. Deconstructing Shakespeare’s text, the intensely physical and theatrically unique piece is a welcome departure from the predictable and listless Shakespeare productions we’ve become accustomed to.

There’s nothing remotely conventional about Isabella. Director Dan Rothenberg’s imaginative production uses Measure’s themes of death, decay and desire to investigate the politics of persuasion and the origins of physical attraction.

Created by Pig Iron in collaboration with dramaturg Suli Holum, the action takes place entirely in a morgue (appropriate given the performance venue is the Icebox Projects Space) ruled over by an introverted mortician (the affecting Charles Conwell). It’s a cold, eerily quiet and disconcertingly lifeless environment—and the first 10 minutes of the play are performed in total silence. The tone changes when the mortician resurrects the corpses to aid him in staging a zombie production of Measure, with the mortician taking the role of the Duke.

It’s both an amusing and disturbing sight as the half-blind corpses stumble about the room and haltingly transform Shakespeare’s words into grunts. But as the corpses’ speech improves and the play’s language turns dark, the audience laughter grows fainter.

Isabella retains Measure’s central plot, focusing on Claudio (Gabriel Quinn Bauriedel), a young man who’s been sentenced to death for seduction. His sentencer Angelo (Dito van Reigersberg) is a stern deputy administrator ordered by the Duke to restore morality to a city rife with sin and depravity. Angelo will stay the execution only if Claudio’s sister Isabella (Birgit Huppuch) comes to his bed. Isabella—a nun—refuses his offer, leading a stricken Claudio to imagine his own death: “Ay, but to die, and go we know not where; to lie in cold obstruction and to rot.”

Angelo evokes an even more gruesome image of death: “Lying by the violet in the sun, do as the carrion does, not as the flower, corrupt with virtuous season.” It’s these and other images of death and fear that Rothenberg’s production conjures so magnificently.

Like the characters they portray, the corpses in Isabella are aware of their own demise. Struggling to recall how their minds once controlled their bodies, their clumsy, tortured movements are painful to watch. Angelo’s own struggles between body and mind are seen in his inability to reconcile his own sexual desires with his moral authority. Unsure if he’s attracted to Isabella’s body or mind, he wonders, “Dost though desire her foully for those things that make her good?”

For all its naked bodies and rotting morality, Isabella is neither sexy nor grotesque. And while a zombie production of Shakespeare might sound bizarre, there’s nothing freakish about Isabella. Imaginatively performed, realistically designed and superbly directed, Isabella reminds us that nearly 400 years after his death, Shakespeare remains one of the world’s most compelling investigators of the human condition.

Isabella
Through Sept. 15. $20. Icebox Projects Space, Crane Arts Bldg., 1400 N. American St. 215.413.1318. www.livearts-fringe.org

>>Footlights

Chimpeach Bush
This time of year it’s easy for worthy productions not associated with the Fringe to be overlooked. One show that demands your attention is Simon Levy’s explosive docudrama What I Heard About Iraq, presented in a free staged reading by Theatre of War Productions and Gina Renzi. Adapted by Levy from an article by Eliot Weinberger, Heard uses quotes from politicians, military leaders and soldiers to paint a chilling portrait of American savagery and indifference in the so-called “war on terror.” Recalling the almost criminal incompetence of an administration gone dangerously awry, we hear Bush triumphantly declare: “We’re not going to have any casualties,” along with Dick Cheney’s: “We’ll be greeted as liberators.” A chilling and disturbing look at the deathly consequences of a needless and polarizing war, the reading is followed by a moderated panel discussion featuring Iraq Vets Against the War. (J.C.R.)

>> Tues., Sept. 11, 7:30pm. Free. Rotunda, 4014 Walnut St. 215.573.3234. www.therotunda.org