Theater: Julius Caesar

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If an audience comes to the theater expecting something very specific, it's best not to take too long to give them what they want. So it's not surprising that, minutes before his first spoken scene in the new Broadway production of Julius Caesar, Denzel Washington appears from the wings and proceeds downstage to bask in the adoration of his waiting public before the play's real action begins.

During this brief moment, Washington owns the Belasco Theatre. As he purposefully stares out over the audience, his square chin and determined stance imbue in him a sense of respect, obligation, and command. Since Washington's last Broadway appearance in 1988 (in Checkmates), he's won two Oscars and a host of other awards for his film work; it seems evident from the beginning of Julius Caesar that Washington isn't stunt casting, and that this is a deserving homecoming for a man who's been away too long.

Nothing else Washington does, however, lives up to his first imposing impression. When he's forced to rely on a different set of acting and vocal muscles than he's accustomed to using, he becomes every bit the bland, invisible presence that experienced theatregoers have come to fear of Hollywood stars onstage, and that only the rare one (Hugh Jackman, anyone?) is able to defy. Despite playing a great role (Marcus Brutus) in a classic drama, Washington might as well be walking and talking his way through a February Sweeps episode of an NBC hourlong drama.

As Brutus is the central character in this play - one of Shakespeare's most baldly political - this is a problem from the outset, as we must implicitly understand Brutus's confliction about whether or not to kill the new leader Caesar, about how far is too far to go after what he believes in. Washington is less one-color in his portrayal than he is unwilling or unable to demonstrate his ability to paint with a wide variety of hues. You get the gist of Brutus's problems and solutions throughout, but he emerges as more a faded sepia-toned photograph than a vivid, realistic portrait.

Yet the happy irony is that the production surrounding Washington is of the eye-opening, electrifying kind that you long for at any Shakespeare play today. Director Daniel Sullivan has created here the most captivating Shakespeare production I've seen since Lincoln Center's Henry IV in 2003. As Jack O'Brien did with that production, Sullivan has found a way to wrap all of the topical gravity of Julius Caesar in a smart-looking, smart-sounding, and energetic package that mostly lives up to the hype surrounding Washington. That's no small achievement.