Review: The rising passion, and artistry, of Synetic's 'Antony and Cleopatra'

The discipline of the unison moments of Synetic's choreography is always impressive, but in this staging the rigor is taken to another level. You may find yourself trying to imagine for days afterward how 10 cutlass-carrying actors can synchronize the crossing of their weapons so that it sounds as if only a single pair of blades were meeting. And how well do those blades have to be handled for them to give off actual sparks?

Shakespeare's plot, about the general who falls for the royal Egyptian temptress and battles the Roman emperor with whom he formerly shared power, is not as solidly fixed in the popular imagination as the others Synetic has taken on. So it's a credit to the adapters that the story plays out so accessibly. Paata Tsikurishvili and Weinberger do a fair amount of tinkering; to give the narrative more sweep, they graft onto their production, for instance, the climactic assassination in "Julius Caesar." It's enacted artfully in a sequence in the Roman Senate, where Brutus (Peter Pereyra) and his accomplices carry out the crime, the blows dramatized as the leaving of individual bloody palm prints on the white sash of Kavsadze's Caesar.

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Simes's set consists of one dominant structure, a functional, towering pyramid equipped with steps and doors, and the lavish wardrobe she's designed adds the cinematic patina of an old-style costume epic, down to gilded get-ups for the Egyptian tomb dwellers. She has come up with some witty props, too, such as the pair of miniature barges Antony and the queen use to convey flirtatious messages to each other across a banquet table.

The wit is at all times apropos, even in this adaptation's most outrageous scene, in which Fletcher's imperious Octavius Caesar performs a lewd pas de deux with a dummy -- presumably a mocking version of Cleopatra, whom he scorns in the text as a whore.

Werntz is expressively convincing as the emperor's sister, Octavia, whose arranged marriage to Antony outrages Cleopatra -- no one seems able to spin a tantrum quite like Irina. And Mills, the Gumby-esque Puck of Synetic's "Midsummer," is here cast as Cleopatra's No. 1 gofer, and he manages the creepy illusion of slithering like some kind of enchanted insect.

The center, though, is held by Cunis and Irina Tsikurishvili, utterly persuasive as the kind of obsessive, incautious lovers who could dance their way to oblivion. And this on a defining evening for Synetic, when the company dances away with your heart.

Antony and Cleopatra

Adapted from Shakespeare by Paata Tsikurishvili and Nathan Weinberger. Directed by Paata Tsikurishvili. Choreography, Irina Tsikurishvili; sound, Irakli Kavsadze; fight choreography, Ben Cunis. With Ben Russo, Scott Brown, Chris Galindo, Vato Tsikurishvili. About 90 minutes. Through Feb. 28 at Lansburgh Theatre, 450 Seventh St. NW. Call 202-547-1122 or visit http://www.synetictheater.org.