A generosity of spirit envelops `Tempest`

A circle of white sand occupies centerstage where `The Tempest` is on view.

New York: A circle of white sand occupies center stage at the Brooklyn Academy of Music`s Harvey Theater where Sam Mendes` enchanting production of "The Tempest" is now on view. This pristine beach represents the mystical island where Prospero, the deposed Duke of Milan, lives in rueful exile with his daughter Miranda. It`s an eerie, Eden-like environment that is perfectly captured in this Bridge Project production, running in rep (through March 13) with "As You Like It," another of Shakespeare`s more fanciful plays.

Both works exude a generosity of spirit, but "The Tempest" especially is filled with a forgiveness that finds its most vivid expression in Prospero, played here by a shaggy, professorial Stephen Dillane. It`s lovely, understated performance, augmented with occasional flashes of anger when justice must be served. Dillane has a deceptively easy way with Shakespeare`s verse, making it sound charmingly conversational. The more florid poetry is left to Ariel, the play`s ethereal creature, Ariel, the sprite who does Prospero`s bidding. Christian Camargo gives the role a sexually ambiguous spin, almost flirtatious in his willingness to win his freedom. As Miranda, Juliet Rylance (a definitive Rosalind in "As You Like It") reconfirms her talent at playing spirited Shakespeare heroines. Her scenes with Ferdinand (an ardent Edward Bennett) — moments of giddy romance — demonstrate why she is one of the best young classical actresses on either side of the Atlantic. And that`s what the Bridge Project is all about: an amalgamation of actors from the United States and Great Britain under the direction of Mendes. The performers work well together, most noticeably in the comic scenes. For example, the rowdy, American-style humor of Thomas Sadoski as Stephano, a drunken butler, meshes nicely with the superb music-hall timing of a jocular Anthony O`Donnell as the jester Trinculo. And there is excellent work by a serpentine, servile Ron Cephas Jones as an almost reptilian Caliban, who plots revenge on Prospero, and by Michael Thomas as one of the play`s halfhearted villains shipwrecked on the island. Beside that circle of sand, set designer Tom Piper fills the back of the theater with an elongated pool of water, which glistens in Paul Pyant`s evocative lighting. It lends a satisfying shimmer to the magic that permeates this delightful celebration of reconciliation and redemption. Bureau Report