Danes and Dagmar in lupine adventureland

Who's afraid of Beowulf? Not the Yale Dramat, whose jaunty new production of the Old Saxon terror breathes irreverent life into pagan Scandinavia. Matthew O'Neill's, DC '00, effervescent direction dares to re-package English literature as a virtual reality joy ride, a lucidly imagined Rennaissance Fair in the basement of the University Theater.

KATHERINE ALDRICH/YH Jack Nicholson is not in this 'Wolf.' But Jacob Grigolia-Rosenbaum, JE '00, is.

Visitors to Heorot, grand mead-hall of the Danes and home of the ailing, avuncular King Hrothgar (Brian Johnson, BK '01), are greeted by enthusiastic guides dressed in medieval couture who point out features of the set like museum docents—here's the king's throne, there's my friend Dagmar, isn't the princess pretty, and so on. There are no seats. Instead, the audience is herded around the auditorium by guards, gasping firesnakes and whatever else happens to be lurking around. The experience entertains in the same uncanny way as mock-ups of famous world landmarks in an amusement park. Impressive sets that surround the Experimental Theater (designed by Gregory McKneally, BR '00) and flawless light and ambient sound (by Lauren Schell, DC '02, and Michael Levinson, BR '00, respectively) make the total immersion more believable.

Perhaps the Dramat is atoning for a remote Macbeth by portraying the distant past with bubbly intimacy. Scott Peterman, JE '02, as the bard Esher, presents an amiable, commanding emcee. He sets the scene with a confident voice and then seamlessly blends into the crowd—exemplifying the communal spirit of the whole production. One of the reasons the show is such fun throughout is that the cast seems to enjoy working together so much. Another is the stunning interactive ensemble—Julia Hart, CC '03, Erik A. Johnson, PC '02, Nina Rastogi, BR '02, Michael Tynan Wighton, SY '03, and Elissa A. Yudofsky, ES '03—all of whom drip with charisma and function as living scenery.

The story moves along rapidly, creating a genuine carnival atmosphere, but it soon becomes clear that something is rotten in Denmark. Grendel (Billy Schraufnagel, DC '03), a leather-chic commando version of Freddy Krueger with a metal claw and a mechanical voice, appears out of the mucky fens and starts carrying off vassals for brunch. Schraufnagel invests his evil, man-eating demon with pathos and a surprising amount of psychological depth; it turns out he's a mama's boy who thwarts parental authority by hacking and eating unfortunate knights. Chipo Chung, TC '00, who plays Grendel's Dame and was also head-witch Hecate in Macbeth, is so good with Freudian monster mothers that she might want to make a career out of it.

As interesting as all this is, though, it's also where the script goes off course, and Beowulf never fully recovers. The adaptation by Jacob Grigolia-Rosenbaum, JE '00, (who doubles as Beowulf) and O'Neill doesn't have all the muscular music of Seamus Heaney's Whitbread-winning translation. But it is clear and displays fine dramatic sense—perhaps too much sense, in fact. Giving Grendel a back-story makes him a better character, but it also defeats the essential "otherness" that makes Beowulf, and its nocturnal happenings, so mysterious. When Grendel screams "This is for mother!" before heading into battle, he sounds less like the boogieman than Norman Bates.

Theater

Beowulf Directed by Matthew O'Neill University Theater Experimental Space Fri., Apr. 7, 8 and 10 p.m. Sat., Apr. 8, 1, 3, 8 and 10 p.m. $8, $5 students

Likewise, the adaptation often updates the plot according to a current Hollywood formula for reviving epic literature; I don't want to trivialize the work of this fine production, but it's tough to avoid analogies to recent Disney cartoons. Grendel surrounded by his sycophantic firesnakes bears more than a passing resemblance to Scar and his hyenas in The Lion King. Beowulf himself cuts a fine figure—heroic, cocky, though perhaps a little too slight as played by Grigolia-Rosenbaum. His journey overseas to ease Danish woes and lop off monstrous heads has the substantial feel of all good myths. But, for reasons of time and space, his entire Geat militia has been compressed into a comical sidekick named Wiglaf (Michael Walker, DC '00). Instead of the poem's climactic one-on-one fight between Grendel's mom and Beowulf, we get a lesson about friendship when Wiglaf comes to his comrade's aid. An exotic code of ethics is exchanged for anachronistic middle-class morality. Furthermore, the harsh Germanic cadences captured by Heaney are frequently exchanged for modern slang: Grendel proclaims, "There's a stranger in town...and it's a whole new game."

None of this alters what a great time Beowulf is. No other Yale production in recent memory promises such a good time for a group of friends, and no other show blurs the line so effectively between actors and audience. At the end of the night, everyone is closer than when they entered, having collaborated together to build the play. If the experience ultimately feels a little hollow, perhaps it's because making the stage and Beowulf itself more accessible sacrifices some of the mystery that lends meaning to both.

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