Merrimack Rep scores
Well, the metaphor about scoring doesn’t work for boxing, but it’s sports-oriented and it’s the truth. The latest play from the MRT is a winner, but I’m sorry to report that Sunday was the final performance of Tunney/Shakespeare in Six Rounds by David E. Lane. I went at the last minute, having missed my regular night and switched my tickets twice (luckily they are very forgiving toward regular subscribers), and I’m so glad I made it. I couldn’t figure out how boxing and Shakespeare could intersect in a meaningful way, but the playwright wove the facts about world heavyweight champion Gene Tunney into an engrossing narrative about life, luck, and philosophy that is a total knockout (there, that one works!). Tunney came across Shakespeare accidentally when in the Marines and heading off to war in 1918 and reading the plays literally changed his life. He uses lines and scenes from the plays (not all of them the big names like Hamlet either; he draws on The Winter’s Tale, Troilus and Cressida and, especially, Coriolanus) to highlight turning points in his own life and to illuminate the behavior of other boxers. He credits Shakespeare with his successes both in and out of the ring, but also with an ability to see beyond success, to capture small, rare, hard-won insights into the meaning of life. Actor Jack Wetherall was flawless in delivery and timing and portrayed a genial, thoughtful, big-hearted man, a thinker as well as a man of action. We couldn’t believe this was David Lane’s first play! I’m just sorry I can’t go see it again right away.