Review: LA TEMPESTAD at Trinity Rep

Shakespeare’s The Tempest is most known for being a play about magic and redemption, forgiveness and grace. But at its core, it might most be a play about usurpers of thrones and titles, islands and spirits. 

La Tempestad, playing at Trinity Rep through April 27, uses the power of language to highlight the struggles for sovereignty that run through Shakespeare’s play. Translated and adapted by Orlando Hernández, with Tatyana-Marie Carlo and Leandro "Kufa" Castro, and directed by Christie Vela, this bilingual version of Shakespeare’s The Tempest moves between Spanish and English — with subtitles of each projected above the stage — and features a new ending. Together, these elements invite audiences to more deeply consider the postcolonial violence that underscores much of the play’s action. 

La Tempestad features Prospero (Mauro Hantman), an overthrown and exiled Milanese duke who has himself commanded power on a small island, using his magic to enslave both the island’s previous ruler, Caliban (Gloria Vivica Benavides), and its indigenous spirit, Ariel (Alexander Crespo-Rosario II). When his usurping brother Antonio (Alison Russo) and his royal accomplices happen to sail near the island, Prospero seizes the opportunity for an unplanned reunion: he commands Ariel to spin up a wild storm that strands all of the boat's passengers on the island, where encounters both accidental and magical spur schemes, spark infatuations, and plant seeds (in some) for reparation.

To reflect their different political positions, each character deploys Spanish and English differently, depending on the situation: for example, the shipwrecked Milanese nobles speak in English until Ariel’s magic touches them, while Caliban speaks both languages in dialog but soliloquizes only in Spanish. Sometimes a single language dominates a scene; other times, characters bounce quickly between the two, even speaking both in a single line. The concept is smart and apt: in a play rife with acts of overthrow and oppression, the bilingual script highlights the complex, dynamic relationship between power and language. 

Because the timing and regularity of these language shifts depend on the situation and speaker, though, I found it hard to predict when to look at the subtitles, which, as a nonbilingual viewer, I was reliant upon to follow the show. I also was sometimes slow to find where to look on a given slide, since the quick shifts between languages meant many slides included both. As a result, I missed some of the nuance, both of the play's script and its performances.

Executing the show is a technical feat for the crew — who must synchronize subtitle slides with line delivery every couple of lines — and the cast, who ably navigate between Shakespearean English and contemporary Spanish. Standouts include Gloria Vivica Benavides, who brings sophisticated senses of timing and subtle gesture to Caliban, and Lily Kops, who animates Prospero’s teenaged daughter Miranda with an outspoken guilelessness that make a charming departure from more wide-eyed interpretations of the role. And Alexander Crespo-Rosario II — whose dancing prowess has graced several local productions, perhaps most memorably in a demonically-possessed Morris dance during Burbage Theatre Co’s 2023 production of The Witch — brings an otherworldly physicality to the island’s spirit, Ariel.

While its technical elements may present challenges for some audience members, La Tempestad’s ambitious take on a Shakespearean classic casts new light on the play’s complex portrayal of both power and the deceptions we resort to when we lack it.

Trinity Rep’s La Tempestad runs through April 27 at 201 Washington Street, Providence, RI.