Shakespeare & Company’s new fall production is “The 39 Steps,” a huge hit on Broadway and now a favorite of theater companies across the country. When Alfred Hitchcock made his film of “Steps” in 1935, he stayed close to John Buchan’s 1915 novel, a noir tale of espionage and the effort to steal British plans for a new aircraft engine. Various productions for the screen followed. Then in 2005, along came Patrick Barlow, who reworked the plot as a farce in which all characters — and there are many — are played by only four actors. Well, three really, since one actor plays the protagonist, Richard Hannay, throughout. While a thin thread of the original story remains, Barlow’s “Steps” is all buffoonery, double entendres and references to several of Hitchcock’s most famous films. Lightening quick costume changes, ridiculous accents and sex reversals are the order of the day as the three actors take up and drop characters like hot potatoes, don and discard wigs, pantomime a chase atop a moving train or die with comic gusto. Such fun, you say. Well, yes, for a while. Then the conceit begins to wear thin, and you are watching talented actors race from role to role in what has become a silly play without the redeeming charm and absurdity of great farce. Happily, the performances from four of the company’s best trained and most flexible actors are delightful enough to make much of the evening pleasant if not memorable. Jason Asprey, suave and a bit self-pitying as Richard Hannay, a single Englishman of plummy accent and limited social life, goes to the theater one evening to see Mr. Memory, a mnemonist, and is suddenly drawn into the web woven by the sinister 39 Steps gang. He is rushed to his apartment by Annabella Schmidt — played by the veteran Elizabeth Aspenlieder in one of her three roles — who is soon murdered. Of course Hannay is suspected of the crime, but he escapes, determined to find the real murderer. Aspenlieder later becomes a hilarious Scottish farm wife, Margaret McTyte, and a blonde beauty who captivates — literally in the second act — Hannay. Each role gives the actor license to use her skills at accent and physical comedy. (Her death throes in the first act are nearly unending.) All of the dozens of other characters are played with gusto, energy and comedic commitment by David Joseph and Josh Aaron McCabe. Joseph is best as the turbaned Mr. Mystery, with false teeth and large eyeglasses spouting his lines in a funny, if politically incorrect, Anglo-Indian accent. His female characters are well done, too, helped by his large, dark eyes. McCabe is best of all, perhaps. His turns as the villain, Professor Jordan, with his white cat — a marvelously manipulated hand puppet — are the funniest in the play. Jonathan Croy, the company’s man of comedy, has both directed and created the minimal scenery and props for “Steps.” His clever use of steamer trunks is a delight, especially when they become railway cars for the chase atop the speeding train. But even he can make little out of a long, tedious scene between Hannay and two traveling lingerie salesmen or of a mostly incomprehensible election rally in Scotland. Part of the problem — at least for me — is that “Steps” plays in the intimate, stepped-seats-on-three-sides Bernstein Theatre. The actors come and go through openings in heavy black drapes, and many of their wig and costume changes occur in front of our eyes or barely out of sight. Performance on a proscenium stage would help conceal the surprises. “The 39 Steps” runs at Shakespeare & Company in Lenox, MA, through Nov. 4. For tickets call 413-637-3353 or go to www.shakespeare.org.
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Greg Fricke and James Boehmer, co-owners of Peggy Mercury in Kent, recently launched their first fashion line, “Imaginary Concerts.”
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Fricke and Boehmer are not there to stock their shelves with the same products customers find at standard makeup retailers. They’re there to help customers find what works for them. That usually means asking customers about themselves and learning about their beauty habits, skin, style and the way they like to present themselves. Fricke and Boehmer believe it’s their job to help customers bring out the qualities that suit them and determine what works best for their look.
So much of the Peggy Mercury world is about emboldening people to become more creative, and possibly bolder, versions of themselves. Some of this comes through the store’s creative collaborations with artists, designers and stylists.
It’s part of an ethos that encourages them and their friends to use the shop as a kind of laboratory, trying out new creative experiments without knowing how they might turn out. Whether in fashion, painting, fiber arts or photography, the projects almost always turn out marvelously.
A line of sterling silver charms they sell started as a small project by their friend Nolan Percival. In the beginning, the pieces were for close friends and loved ones. But Boehmer and Fricke encouraged Percival to get a little more serious about the project and create a whole line for the store. Today, it’s one of their top-selling collections.
Classic styles, bold colors, and creative concerts make up the “Imaginary Concerts” line at Peggy Mercury.Provided
“Imaginary Concerts” has the duo taking their own advice.
The project started as a way for Boehmer to connect with his mother, who had been diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease. Taking old concert shirts from his own collection, Boehmer and his mother began cutting out the graphics with the idea that they would make a quilt together. Unfortunately, she died before they could complete the project in 2025. The pieces, which were ready for production, were put on the back burner as Boehmer and Fricke dealt with their loss and the whirlwind of projects that never seemed to cease at Peggy Mercury.
But the harsh winter of 2026 presented an opportunity to take some time and focus on themselves. Part of that meant revisiting and redefining the concert T-shirt project. This time, instead of looking to the warmth and comfort of a quilt, they turned to another passion — fashion.
Taking a page from their own book, they wanted to create something that felt comfortable to them. They took two disparate loves — one rooted in simple preppy style, with clean lines and classic silhouettes, and the other in the nitty gritty worlds of punk rock and pop — and blended them together to create something entirely new. Pulling from the staples of vintage Brooks Brothers and Charvet collections, they applied the graphic elements with bold stitching reminiscent of punk jackets of the ‘70s and ‘80s, but with a much more sophisticated air.
But the remixing isn’t just the pairing of prep and punk. The pieces are not canon. They take liberties with the realities of concert tours, combining one band’s dates with another band’s logos, mixing them all up until the reality is lost and imagination is the only truth.
Shirts from Peggy Mercury’s first fashion line, “Imaginary Concerts,” hang on display.Provided
Adding to the mix is an element of perpetual creativity. Art can be messy, both figuratively and literally, and many of Fricke and Boehmer’s artist friends carry evidence of their work on them at all times. As a nod to these tireless creatives, the duo added haphazard splashes of bright color, giving the line an even more distinctive feel.
For them, “Imaginary Concerts” passes the “Peggy Test.” The mythical Peggy Mercury is a fictional figurehead for the company, a character who thrives on creativity and change. The name, much like the clothing line, is a mixture of interests: Mercury is a planet, a deity and an elusive, transformative element, while Peggy is the wonderfully stylish and boundary-pushing Peggy Guggenheim.
Everything Fricke and Boehmer put in their store has to pass this test: Would Peggy Mercury approve? For their first collection, the answer is a resounding yes.
Peggy Mercury is at 9 Maple St., Unit 2, Kent.
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