Theater Review: Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead

Ronen's energetic, inventive production, not only quotes from the works of Kafka, Beckett and Sartre, but enters the paranoia of a post- 9/11 world.

By HELEN KAYE
By Tom Stoppard Translated and directed by Yael Ronen Video by Ohad Levitan Cameri Theater January 21 Unimportant bit players in Hamlet, Rosencrantz (Yaniv Biton) and Guildenstern (Yoav Levy) are the protagonists of Stoppard's black comedy, not that it does them any good. Like Vladimir and Estragon in 'Waiting for Godot,' they are clueless, floundering in a situation that's not of their making and over which they have no control. They are the pawns and the patsies of some absurd cosmic joke in which Death is the only certainty. Its inevitability stalks the play whose plot follows the same events of 'Hamlet.' The Player King (Rami Baruch) is Death's messenger, though it takes a while for those two hopeful, hopeless boobs to get the point. In between there's language, Stoppard's scalpel words that lull or lacerate, depending on who's talking, or who's listening. 'Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead,' written in 1964, nods to the absurd, a theatrical genre based on the premise that there are no certainties and that man inhabits a senseless and arbitrary universe. Ronen's energetic, inventive production, set in the 'Hamlet' stage space, not only quotes from the works of Kafka, Beckett and Sartre, but enters the paranoia of a post- 9/11 world. The 'Hamlet' texts and actors are delivered via video. Security cameras record every nuance, some of it live. Ruth Dar's set of mostly space and steps occupies 360 degrees and the audience swivels to follow the action. The excellent special effects steal focus sometimes, distracting us from Biton's marvelously manic Rosencrantz, Levy's equally intense but more measured Guildenstern, and from Baruch, whose assured Player King is a magnificent anchor.