Review: Prospero's Project Pleases in Renaissance Now's "The Tempest"
The Tempest Written by William Shakespeare Adapted and directed by Kathy Curtiss Presented by Renaissance Now Theatre & Film at Chain Theatre 312 West 36 Street, Floor 3 & 4, Manhattan, NYC July 2-5, 2025 Carter McEwan, (Mariner), Ethan Freestone (Trinculo), Grace Fillmore (Boatswain), Seth Johnson (Ferdinand). Photo by Jonathan Slaff. The Tempest is one of William Shakespeare's plays most overtly concerned with art and its presentation, making it, in a metatheatrical sense, a particularly apt choice for Renaissance Now Theatre & Film's third season of Shakespearean plays adapted with additions of dialogue in contemporary prose, or "now speak," to highlight themes relevant to contemporary audiences. There exists a long tradition of interpreting sorcerer Prospero's magical "art" as an analogue for theater due to his managing of plot and spectacle throughout The Tempest , and while the "now speak" of this Tempest , courtesy of dire...