By William Shakespeare
Music by Todd Almond
Choreography by Chase Brock
Directed by Rebecca Taichman

The Old Globe

“The most memorable part of the Old Globe’s Twelfth Night is a scene change. At the beginning, except for an Astroturf oval on the floor and the portrait of a marble angel on the rear wall, things are mostly colorless. Then suggestions of red occur, followed by three shields with red roses painted on them. Then the memorable part: at the top of Act Two, Geneviève Waïte’s “Love Is Coming Back” purrs from the loudspeakers, and Olivia’s attendants enter carrying gobs of roses. They drop them on the floor or toss them into the mini estuary upstage. Then wheelbarrows dump scads into the water. The stage becomes a Valentine’s Day blur of reds in sync with Waite’s lyrics: “Romance is on the rise/ And all across the world/ boys and girls are making eyes.””

– San Diego Reader

“Amid the play’s ever-expanding web of romantic entanglements, Taichman and Co. conjure some memorable stage pictures: the wheelbarrows full of roses that a gaggle of young women trundle out gleefully and toss around; the amusing impulse among the duke Orsino’s acolytes to mimic his poses; the way the lovesick noblewoman Olivia shouts “Stay!” and prostrates herself comically on the turf while the object of her ardor begins to exit.”

– Los Angeles Times

“You’ll be hard-pressed to find a production of Twelfth Night as beautifully conceived as the one that just opened the Old Globe Theatre’s Summer Shakespeare Festival. Every choice of color, from the azure blue scenic backdrop to scatterings of blood-red roses to Olivia’s ever-changing gowns, is meticulous and exquisite. Each of Feste the fool’s underplayed musical interludes, whether accompanying himself on fiddle or ukulele, intersects the play’s masquerading lovers’ moods or subtly counteracts the mischief of its pranksters. This Twelfth Night is awash in visual and theatrical surprises, all the more impressive for a Shakespearean comedy so frequently staged.  This production is a triumph of unfettered romance (as big as the wheelbarrows full of roses at the start of Act 2) that complements the play’s thinly veiled mistaken identities and broad comic antics.  This enchanting show’s got some magic going for it.”

– San Diego CityBeat