Shakespeare’s ‘As You Like It’ takes stage in Grinnell tonight

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GRINNELL — The Grinnell College Department of Theatre and Dance will present Shakespeare’s 1600 romantic comedy “As You Like It” Friday through Sunday in Roberts Theatre in the Bucksbaum Center for the Arts on the Grinnell College campus.

Long recognized as the greatest English pastoral play, “As You Like It” sends a group of noble refugees from the pomp of court life out to the pastures and forest of Arden, where the banished Duke and his court make “sweet use of adversity,” and the heroine Rosalind, disguised as a shepherd boy, tries and tests her lover Orlando. The play both celebrates and mocks “the simple life” and the follies of romantic love. Court and country, sophisticated and simple, sonneteering swains and goatgirls — Shakespeare builds the play by contrasts and ends it in harmony, as fortunes are restored, the lost are found and four pairs of lovers are married.

“As You Like It” is a holiday, filled with wit, song, dance, pageantry and the redeeming wisdom of the “good in everything.” Grinnell’s production is set in Regency England and draws on 19th-century Arcadian landscape design and art.

Ellen Mease, associate professor of theatre, directs the play. Guest artist Stewart Benjamin Farrar designs set, lights and props, and resident designer Erin Howell-Gritsch provides the Regency costumes.

Curtain times are 7:30 p.m. for the Friday and Saturday performances and 2 p.m. for the Sunday performance.

Tickets are required for this free event and may be obtained at the Bucksbaum Center for the Arts ticket office.

The Bucksbaum Center for the Arts is located at 1108 Park St. on the Grinnell College campus.

Box office and ticket information is available at http://web.grinnell.edu/theatre/facilities/box_office.html or by calling (641) 269-4444.

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