PERICLES IS WORTH THE VOYAGE

A questionable framing device doesn’t sink
Boston Court’s lively take on Shakespeare’s
rarely staged adventure

Adam J. Smith, Nicole Javier, and Randolph Thompson

The groundlings who attended William Shakespeare’s Pericles, Prince of Tyre back in 1608 (or 1619, hard to nail these dates down) would certainly have gotten their penny’s worth, as did the audience at the West Coast premiere of Ellen McLaughlin’s modern verse translation, Pericles, now at Boston Court Pasadena.

Nicole Javier

A famous poet (Joel Swetow as John Gower, 1330–1408)^[1] ushers the audience into the adventures of the titular young prince of Tyre (Randolph Thompson), who arrives in Antioch hoping to win the king’s beautiful daughter. Instead, he solves a riddle that exposes an incestuous relationship between father and daughter and wisely gets out of Dodge lickety-split.

Adam J Smith, Troy Leigh-Anne Johnson, Julanne Chidi Hill, and Alexander Matos

From there, Pericles becomes one of Shakespeare’s most wildly episodic adventures, sending its hero across the Mediterranean through famine, shipwrecks, romance, marriage, another storm, and the birth of his daughter Marina. Along the way, Pericles encounters a sizable assortment of kings, governors, assassins, pirates, physicians, pimps, and other colorful characters as Shakespeare piles one improbable turn of fortune upon another.

Pericles

McLaughlin’s modern verse interpretation of Pericles is a slick, pared-down reworking, and her translation is intelligently woven, retaining enough of the Bard’s original language to appease snotty purists like myself, while dropping the “coigns,” “Yslacked,” “pilch,” “beadle,” and Latin asides that have most of us perusing the Folger editions’ notes for definitions.^[2]

Desiree Mee Jung and Jamie Gallo

The primary trouble with the production is the framing device that director Margaret Shigeko Starbuck sets the action in. Described in the program as “An Emergency Evacuation Shelter” (designed by Michelle Joo), it is a concept plucked from the 1965 musical Man of La Mancha, set, not in a dungeon of the Spanish Inquisition, but what appears to be the Hollywood High School gym. Those in the gym are a hodgepodge of refugees seeking shelter from a raging hurricane without, a nice tie-in to the play’s multiple storms. But why these diverse souls so readily engage in an impromptu performance of Pericles at the bidding of Gower, who, like Cervantes in the classic musical, goes among them assigning roles from the dramatis personae, is a bit puzzling. (Though it serves as a means of cutting back on the expense of period costuming.)

Desiree Nee Jung, Nicole Javier, and Julanne Chidi Hill

The Boston Court production overcomes this conceptual misstep thanks to a strong cast and a stronger director. Swetow, Adam J. Smith, Rio Rasch, Desiree Mee Jung, and Julanne Chidi Hill do most of the heavy lifting for the cast, while Alexander Matos as Lysimachus carries his own weight, and Thompson is a sturdy hub for the overall production.

Joel Swetow

Director Starbuck employs a glorious array of theatrical invention, with a slew of whimsical props supplied by Rye Mandel, including a collection of skulls, a soccer ball reminiscent of Tom Hanks’ beloved co-star “Wilson” from the 2000 film Cast Away, and pool noodles employed as jousting lances. Also contributing to the success of the show are the costumes by Nala Zinngrabe, Pablo Santiago’s lighting, and John Ballinger’s sound and music artistry. It is only in the reunion of father and daughter, a scene that has reduced me to tears in prior productions, that her firm hand wavers.

Randolph Thompson, Joel Swetow, Adam J. Smith, and Rio Rasch

Boston Court’s Pericles offers several strong incentives for seeing it. It is one of the Bard’s most infrequently staged works. While Shakespeare wrote the second half, scholars generally agree that George Wilkins, pimp, innkeeper, and occasional playwright, penned the first portion. As preeminent Bardolater Harold Bloom observed: “Perhaps because he declined to compose the first two acts, Shakespeare compensated by making the remaining three acts into his most radical theatrical experiment since the mature Hamlet of 1600–1601.” Most importantly, this Pericles is a great deal of fun.

Randolph Thompson

[1] Shakespeare, along with co-writer Wilkins, based Pericles primarily on Gower’s medieval poem Confessio Amantis, making it the only play where the Bard acknowledged from whom he stole the plot.

[2] “corners,” “relaxed,” “a cloak of fur,” and “a minor official who whips beggars away.”

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photos by Brian Hashimoto

Pericles
Boston Court Pasadena in partnership with Play On Shakespeare
Boston Court Pasadena, 70 N. Mentor Ave. in Pasadena
Thurs.–Sat. at 7:30; Sun. at 2; select Sat. at 2
2 hours and 25 minutes, including intermission
ends Sept 27, 2026
tickets $10–$82, including fees
for tickets, call 626.683.6801 or visit Boston Court Pasadena

for more shows, visit Theater in Los Angeles

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