Enrique Bravo as Orlando and Alysia Reiner as Rosalind in As You Like It, playing in Westerly.

Karen Baker

After taking last summer off, Westerly’s Colonial Theatre is back, and better than ever. The company, which stages Shakespeare in Wilcox Park each summer, is putting on a dandy As You Like It through Aug. 3, a show that sings thanks to a very strong cast.

The Colonial usually manages to recruit some pretty solid talent for its productions, but this year it has outdone itself with the return of veteran actor David Birney as the melancholy Jacques, and two appealing female leads, Alysia Reiner as Rosalind, who pretty much dominates the show, and Purva Bedi as her cousin and best friend, Celia.

Bedi and Reiner both have extensive television and film credits. Birney, of course, was the star of the popular but short-lived sitcom Bridget Loves Bernie, with former wife Meredith Baxter. But Birney has done a lot of theater along the way, both on Broadway and in regional houses. He was in Westerly five years ago to play Shylock in the Colonial’s Merchant of Venice.

But this production is not just a vehicle for star turns. Director Harland Meltzer has managed to put together an As You Like It that holds up well all around, with fine ensemble work and a good deal of energy, even though it runs three hours with intermission.

This is also a pretty straight, traditional telling of the play. It is not, in other words, set in the 1960s, with a bunch of hippies running around in the woods. There has been no tinkering with the characters, it’s just plain unadorned Shakespeare, which is kind of nice for a change.

The free show (donations are welcomed) takes place in a clearing in the downtown park, amid a stage of towering blue and copper columns connected with festive ribbons. These, I suppose, are to represent the trees of the Forest of Arden, where Duke Senior has taken up residence with his band of loyal followers, living like Robin Hood, as Shakespeare put it.

The Duke has lost his throne and title to his younger brother, Duke Frederick, who also banishes Rosalind, Senior’s daughter, to Arden. Cousin Celia says she can’t imagine herself separated from Rosalind, and troops along with her. Actually, just about everyone in the play ends up in Arden. Orlando, Rosalind’s love interest, flees to the forest to escape his nasty brother Oliver, and spends his time there carving Rosalind’s initials into trees and scattering love poems about.

But Orlando doesn’t recognize Rosalind because she has disguised herself as the lad Ganymede. That’s when the plot thickens.

Among the other pluses to this show are Enrique Bravo’s Orlando, who has a nifty wrestling scene with crooner Paul Romero’s Charles and Bob Colonna’s Touchstone the clown. Colonna has a long history with Shakespeare and with comic roles, and here he really shines, as he woos the unsophisticated country girl Audrey, played by Kathleen Katic.

Bravo, who played another love-sick hero two summers ago, when he charmed Colonial audiences as Romeo, is a real natural, an actor who makes it all seem easy.

Birney, on the other hand, gives us a pensive Jacques, a Jacques with the weight of the world on his shoulders. His delivery is deliberate, reflective, and oh so sensitive, which is very much in tune with the character.

Of the two female leads, Bedi was the more charming, with a presence that just pulled you in. Reiner was fine, too, but sounded a little forced as Ganymede, with that cool, hip accent of hers.

The show, of course, makes for a nice summer outing. At Thursday’s opening, patrons brought coolers and beach chairs to spread out on the grass. Others lolled about on blankets with picnic suppers.

But there is a lot more to this production than a chance to relax under the stars. This is first-rate theater, a real keeper of a show.

As You Like It runs through Aug. 3 in Wilcox Park, in downtown Westerly. Admission is free, although donations are accepted. Performances are Tuesday through Sunday at 8 p.m.

cgray@projo.com