The Three Musketeers

"All for one, and one for all!" The famous oath of The Three Musketeers, still rings true today, as evidenced by the swashbuckling production now running at the Colorado Shakespeare Festival. This should pay dividends for artistic Director Phillip Sneed's bold plan to expand the annual summer bardfest to five plays—two of which are outside the Shakespearean canon—to increase audience numbers and revenues, and broaden demographics.

Musketeers, L to R: Stephen Weitz as Athos, Geoffrey Kent as Aramis, Mat Hostetler as d'Artagnan, and Gary Wright as Porthos, get the better of the Cardinal's Guards Photo: Nathan Armes, CU Communications

The script by Linda Alper, Douglas Langworthy, and Penny Metropulos provides director Carolyn Howarth with an impressively distilled and cogent framework to capture the emotional arc, humor, and tristesse of Alexandre Dumas' timeless story. Though set in 17th-century France, the story's themes resonate with us because, despite our own personal disappointments and sorrows, deep down we still aspire for light to prevail upon the human race, which is what we find in the heartwarming bond between d'Artagnan and his three brethren.

Merlin James Alexandre Salisbury's sound design, highlighted by contemporary rock 'n' roll cuts (including a healthy dose of the Rolling Stones) during scene changes, though fun, seem like an unnecessarily obvious reminder of the play's relevance and a missed opportunity for a delightful taste of French period music.

Karen Slack as Milady, the Countess de Winter turns on the charm Photo: Nathan Armes, CU Communications

As with all great dramas, unique characters bring the story alive, and in this production Dumas' portraits are conveyed to the stage with magical results. The multigeneral audience: regaled at fight choreographer Geoffrey Kent's inventive and adventurous sword fights, including a nifty circus derring-do that brought gasps and applause; hissed at the dastardly villains; cheered "the fab four," whenever they made fools of the Cardinal's posse; and suffered along with the heroes at the loss of their loved ones.

Stephen Weitz's deep-in-his-cups Athos, Gary Wright's baroque Porthos, and Geoffrey Kent's thoughtful Aramis paint a colorful portrait of chivalrous and gallant soldiers. Mat Hostetler matures nicely as the erstwhile and talented farm boy, d'Artagnan, who comes to Paris to join the King's musketeers.

Ted Barton's cool, calculating Cardinal Richelieu, Barzin Akhavan's sinister Count de Rochefort, and Karen Slack's seductive Milady, the Countess of Winter, make for a formidable set of bad guys.

Sean Tarrant as the English Duke of Buck- ingham and Alexandra C. Lewis as Queen Anne of France, explore mutual interests Photo: Nathan Armes, CU Communications

Chip Person's flamboyant King Louis XIII, Alexandra C. Lewis' love-starved Queen Anne, and Sean Tarrant's self-possessed Duke of Buckingham fully inhabit Dumas' satirical take on royals.

Anne Murphy fully seizes the opportunity to show off the costuming possibilities; Andrea Bechert's panoramic set provides endless repurposing opportunities, which are appropriately accented by Victor En Yu Tan's flexible lighting scheme.

The Colorado Shakespeare Festival's The Three Musketeers runs in repertory with Macbeth, Love's Labour's Lost, Henry the Eighth, and Woody Guthrie's American Song through August 12th on the University of Colorado–Boulder campus. 303-492-0554 or at www.coloradoshakes.org.

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