CMU’s Midsummer!: A Review
Midsummer! is an electric adaptation of a classic comedy. Adapted by Jeff Whitty (Avenue Q) into a modern verse translation, it remains largely faithful to Shakespeare’s original. Its characters (purportedly situated in Gilded Age Pittsburgh) still speak in archaic English, so that without the text open in front of you it is unclear what is original and what is adaptation, until especially striking lines, such as ‘what hillbillies have we that flounce about,’ reveal the revision, transforming the Elizabethan play into a contemporary comedic tour de force.
While A Midsummer Night’s Dream is admittedly my favourite Shakespeare play, it is not often that I get the pleasure of watching an adaptation that enhances it so spectacularly. Performed in the round in Assembly’s Spiegel Tent at St Andrews Square, audiences are swiftly transported to the magical woods outside of Athens (or Pittsburgh), as actors prance between their seats, hiding behind wooden supports (evocative of trees) to espy the action on centre stage.
The 26 roles the play requires are divided between nine supremely talented actors, making for a gruelling 90 minutes of constant performance, during which the actors never leave the audience's sight. If not performing on centre stage, the actors are weaving between the audience, chasing and hiding from one another, or else transforming from one character into another.
The venue, which is ornamented with small mirrors, makes it impossible to hide. No matter how free the woods are, they are also claustrophobic and uncanny, and it is under Kim Weild’s artful direction that this sense of surveillance is achieved through the positioning of actors in the ‘wings’—whether Titania’s fairies, Oberon’s mischievous servant Puck, or one of the ever-jealous lovers—as they watch the events on centre stage unfold.
Luckily, over the course of the show, each actor will prove both their stamina and skill. The cast is clothed in colourful linens, boots, and corsets, which transform as the night unravels and the revellers grow more debauched. However even without these quick changes, shifts in voice, gait, and demeanor make the movements between characters evident. Already experts at their craft, it is easy to forget that the production’s stars are still students. Sitting in a booth on the left-hand side of the venue, I was lucky enough to observe Celia Evans shift between Hermia, Moth, Snug, and finally the fearsome Lion—each of which seemed to suggest a complete transformation, allowing her to fully inhabit a new character, even when only for a minute or two.
Despite the complexity of its extensive multi-roling, the show seemed effortless—due in large part to the effectiveness of the stage management team, as well as the blocking and choreography, which ensured the actors never once stumbled through complex scenes. The night in the forest reaches its climax during a rave scene, fully immersing audiences in the spectacle of the forest and the lunacy of the dream.
Chaotic, fun, and above all engrossing, CMU’s 2026 production of Midsummer! is bursting with vivacity, talent, and fresh colour.
Images via Mackenzie Breeden
