Otsego Lakeside Setting Makes

Macbeth ‘Exceptionally Evocative’

By LIBBY CUDMORE • AllOTSEGO.com Theater Review

COOPERSTOWN – Is there any venue better for seeing Shakespeare than outside?  The Fenimore Art Museum’s newly opened Lucy B. Hamilton Amphitheater seems almost custom-built for the Glimmer Globe Theatre Company’s production of “Macbeth,” with iron bars, a smooth slate stage and carved hillside for seating.

Performed Aug. 5, 12 and 19, and directed by Austin McCaslin-Doyle, who also leant his directorial skills to White Knuckle Production’s “Dial M For Murder” earlier this summer at the Farmers’ Museum, the show was designed to complement the Glimmerglass Opera’s production of the “Macbeth” opera.

Michael Henrici played the titular Macbeth with swagger and bravado that quickly turns to increasing madness. Henrici played opposite his wife, Danielle Henrici, as Lady Macbeth.  Visibly pregnant with the couple’s first child, her delivery of the line “I have given suck, and know How tender ’tis to love the babe that milks me. I would, while it was smiling in my face, have plucked my nipple from his boneless gums and dashed the brains out, had I so sworn as you have done to this,” is perhaps the most chilling moment of the play.

Gary Koutnik, as always, brings a gravitas to the stage, this time playing the ill-fated Duncan.  His sympathetic, fatherly portrayal makes Macbeth’s decision to murder him for the throne that much more ill-conceived.

Avalon McCaskin-Doyle, playing the inebriated Porter (among other roles) in the moments just before Duncan’s body is discovered, was a standout, adding a great bit of physical comedy to an otherwise dark scene.

Chris Perrotti, fight coordinator, created several exceptional fight scenes, no small feat given the constraints of the small stage.  The costumes were traditional to the time period and the swords were metal, giving a satisfying clash with each blow.

And although the night falling over the lake was exceptionally evocative, especially aided by the clear night and the citronella torches, it did cause some minor issues with actually seeing the action on stage.  After intermission, the stage lights came on, giving quick remedy to this issue.  Overall, a strong ending to Otsego’s thriving summer theater scene.

Cudmore is a reporter for The Freeman’s Journal, Hometown Oneonta and www.allotsego.com