[In the following review of Troilus and Cressida directed by Tom Markus for the Colorado Shakespeare Festival, Brooks-Dillard praises the strength of the production as a whole and also comments on the excellence of the players' performances.]

Troilus and Cressida, one of Shakespeare's lesser-known plays, gets a bang-up production at the Colorado Shakespeare Festival, thanks to strong staging, striking images, excellent performances and the creative vision of director Tom Markus.

As the play starts, the Greek and Trojan armies have been locked in battle for seven years, as the Greek commander seeks to avenge the kidnapping of his wife, Helen, by Paris, the son of the Trojan king.

Markus chooses to set the tale during the Civil War period, with the Trojans as residents of Troy, Ga., and the Greeks as Union soldiers.

The drama has much to say about the tragedy (and foolishness) of war and the unnecessary waste of human life. The message is emphasized by the horrendous matter-of-fact body counts flashed to the audience on a lighted news ticker board that marks the battlefield tolls from Gettysburg, Antietam, Bull Run and more.

Hanging above a stark black-and-white war-era mural that stretches into the distance, the red-lighted news strip, which also announces plot points, is one of many clever ways the script is given a contemporary immediacy.

But even though it has immediacy and Markus has trimmed it considerably, Troilus feels long.

The play has several subplots that must be followed to conclusion. Blond and boyish Troilus (Hayden Adams) is enamored with Cressida (Cheyenne Casebier), a Southern belle of enticing beauty and girlish mannerisms who ultimately turns out to be as faithless as she is charming.

Meanwhile, Troilus' older brother Hector (C. C. Cook), bored with the military inaction, challenges the Greeks to find a champion who will fight him in single combat.

In the Greek camp, their great warrior Achilles (Mitchell McLean) is dissatisfied with his commanders. Refusing to obey orders, he stays in his tent with his friend, Patroclus (Robert Beitzel).

To teach Achilles a lesson, the officers plan to have the lower-ranked Ajax (Gareth Saxe) respond to Hector's challenge.

Ajax may be boorish, crude and pretty stupid, but he's as big as an oak tree.

For their parts, Paris (John Churchill) and Helen (Noel True) seem unaware of the deadly havoc they have caused. Men have died and will continue to die, but the romantic lovers, given to puppyish rough-housing and open displays of affection, frolic like self-involved teenagers.

Punctuated by personal battles, the war continues to escalate. One of the most dramatic moments is a wordless one.

As cannons boom, two soldiers, one in blue and the other in gray, sit hunched over a chessboard in a tableau that says it all.

Christopher Marshall is wondrously annoying and hateful as the Greek Thersites, an angry man who is on nobody's side and tirelessly attacks everyone.

But the most towering performance is that of Richard Kinter as Cressida's rouged, affected Southern-planter type uncle, who observes and manipulates events.

By the end, he's no longer a fluttery, handkerchief-waving comic old man, but is ancient, crippled and bloody, proving that no one really escapes the wasteful tyranny of war.