Puzzling but Pleasing Gender-Bending in As You Like It

The work’s central plot point is Rosalind, one of the Bard’s feistier female characters, deciding to put Orlando’s love to the test. In drag, she somehow convinces him to spend his time “pretending” she’s his true love, and she in turn essentially tortures him with high expectations and demands, to see whether his passion will eventually falter. Amanda Quaid’s take on Rosalind is at first excessively girlish, fawning and giggly, which makes her abrupt transition into the masculine Ganymede rather stark, and makes even more confusing Rosalind’s motivation for torturing Orlando as she does (if she generally came off as a women prone to game playing or suspicion of men, it might make more sense). She also relies a bit too much on practiced posturing and knowing glances to invoke Rosalind’s masculine disguise. Still, she’s fun to watch more often than not, even if her performance seems a bit repetitive.

Her counterpart, the underwritten Orlando, is finely underplayed by Noel Velez. It’s the smaller roles in As You Like It that fetch the more attention-grabbing performances, such as Sarah Marshall’s scene-dominating Touchstone (making the Fool character a woman is a twist that lends itself nicely to this gender-bending play), and the loquacious and flirtatious Tonya Beckman Ross as Phebe, who pines for Ganymede as another (the off-note Michael Grew as Silvius) covets her.

Director Derek Goldman has crafted what’s not an entirely modern production, but one with anachronistic touches – the wrestling scene between Orlando and the boorish Charles (Scott McCormick, WWFing it up with glee) is played with contemporary pageantry, costumes and even a video screen accompaniment – it feels a little out of nowhere, but it’s undoubtedly funny. The colorful set, with neon green ladders standing in as trees, is a bit puzzling but certainly eye-catching; the same might be said of the sometimes-garish costumes worn by the forest’s inhabitants. The production’s occasional forays into music are hit and miss – Marcell sells his brooding aside on being a fool in love, but the goddess Hymen’s gospel-y closing number is somewhat abrasive, and the dance scene accompanying it feels awkward.

Folger’s As You Like It is a diverting if not seamless production, much like the Bard’s work itself. But as far as each goes, quibbles aside, there’s more than a little to be said for a successful crowd pleaser.

The play runs through Nov. 25 at the Folger. Tickets are available online.