Tag Archives: Shakespeare

Antony And Cleopatra – September 2012

7/10 (preview)

By William Shakespeare

Directed by Janet Suzman

Venue: Chichester Festival Theatre

Date: Friday 7th September 2012

This was the very first performance of this revived production. Kim Cattrall played Cleopatra before in substantially the same production in Liverpool back in 2010, with the same director, designer and many of the same cast but with a different leading actor (Jeffrey Kissoon took the role in 2010). The Liverpool Playhouse doesn’t have the thrust stage of the Festival Theatre, of course, so changes must have been made to the design, and it’s impossible to say how much the intervening two years has added to the cast’s understanding, so I’ll just concentrate on our experience of this production.

First, the set: from the publicity photos on the Liverpool Playhouse website, I would guess that the basic design is largely unchanged, though presumably the balcony comes further forward than before. A wall of bricks at the back, with a few window arches to break the monotony, had several tall screens in front of it, with the gaps creating doorways; towards the end a complete row of screens blocked the wall off altogether. In front of these was a curved balcony, supported by two pairs of metal pillars down which ran ladders. The open metalwork had simple lines, with a shiny black reflective surface. The floor was also shiny and black in a tiled effect, with a reddish circle in the middle. From the ceiling hung a number of eastern-style lamps; these were lowered at the start, to show we were in Egypt, and raised out of the way for the non-Egyptian scenes. A rectangular trapdoor was well used throughout the performance, particularly to bring up furniture for the various locations and also to remove Enobarbus’s body. The lighting changed significantly from scene to scene, creating a strong sense of location, and while the scene changes were sometimes a little on the slow side, on the whole they kept the pace up reasonably well; this is one aspect that will undoubtedly improve with practice.

The casting was interesting. The Egyptians were almost all played by black actors, with one Indian actor playing the soothsayer and Kim Cattrall as Cleopatra. I reckoned this was to show that the Ptolemies were actually Greek rulers, not native Egyptians. The Romans were all white, and for once this non-colour blind casting was very appropriate. Apart from Jeffrey Kissoon playing Antony, it looks as if this aspect of the casting was similar to last time, and while the style of the costumes was definitely the same, there were individual changes particularly to Cleopatra’s clothes. Kim Cattrall was also playing Cleopatra as a blond this time around; she’d been a brunette before. The costumes were modern for the Romans, with skimpy outfits for the Egyptians and an Indian style get-up for the soothsayer.

The performance began in darkness, with a hissing, whispering sound that made me think of the play’s political contrivances as well as the asps in the final act. I could just make out a figure rising up on a plinth in the centre of the stage, while others were sneaking on round the sides. The music was quite dramatic and when the spotlights hit Cleopatra she was standing on a dais with her back to us, arms outstretched, wearing a golden robe. I have to admit that when the lights shafted down on her, I had a momentary sense that I was watching a horror movie rather than a Shakespeare play, and this effect was strengthened a minute later when she turned around and I could see she was wearing a moulded golden mask – creepy! But I got over it pretty quickly, especially when Demetrius and Philo began their conversation up on the balcony while the rest of the cast stayed frozen down below.

Or almost frozen; during their dialogue Cleopatra turned round and her attendants began to remove her finery – presumably she’d been to a formal function and was now disrobing for some personal time. The final item was the face mask, and after she’d taken it off her dialogue with Antony could begin. She was kittenish, while he (played by Michael Pennington this time) was an old roué who was clearly infatuated with this beautiful younger woman. He capered about, clicking mini castanets, and generally behaving like an old fool, while she indulged and caressed him. Their delivery was clear and it’s nice to be able to hear the dialogue so well but the pace was a little slow, a fault which will again be sorted with a bit more practice.

After Antony and Cleopatra left, Demetrius and Philo finished the scene with their closing comments and departed. Down below, Cleopatra’s attendants had been clearing the stage and so were still present for the next scene with the soothsayer. An Indian actor had been cast in this role as with the 2010 version, and this soothsayer took on other jobs as well. For now, he simply looked briefly at each woman’s hand and then closed it up; there was little reaction to seeing their fates and he remained smooth, unruffled and courteous throughout.

Cleopatra arrived on the balcony with a black shawl over her head. She quickly left when Antony approached, and he heard the messengers on the main stage. Enobarbus’s comments about the women were again a little slow-paced, but we started to warm up with his comments about seeing Cleopatra die so often. That business done, Cleopatra returned and this time I could see how her line “I am sick and sullen” was an instruction to her servants so they could follow her lead in whatever playacting she had chosen. And just as well, as her tendency to collapse meant her servants had to be quick to hold her up. Mind you, she was soon on the floor, then up again, then back on the ground, and changed from sickness to anger in the blink of an eye. Antony was getting more and more frustrated that she wouldn’t listen to him, but when he did get his news out, including the information that Fulvia was dead, Cleopatra still turned it back on him, chiding him for not showing more sadness at the death of his wife. (Honestly, women!) He had almost left the stage before she called him back to say “something”, and her gentleness led to their reconciliation before his departure.

In Rome, Octavius wore a suit, while Lepidus was in formal military gear as I recall. Martin Hutson played Octavius last time as well, and his performance showed a lot of detail which was presumably based on the earlier run. His expressions were a little on the large side for this space and gave him a comical aspect, a bit like his Prince John in The Heart Of Robin Hood earlier this year, but his performance worked well in terms of the play as a whole. I think he was referring to papers in his hand for some of this speech; he certainly did so later on, after the whipped messenger had returned. His lines “this common body, like to a vagabond flag upon the stream, goes to and back, lackeying the varying tide, to rot itself with motion”, a disparaging comment upon the fickle nature of the plebeian class in Rome, was addressed in the audience’s direction, heaven knows why. He left the stage before the end of the scene, and Lepidus had to call him back so he could plead to be kept in the intelligence loop.

Down came the lamps again and we were back in Egypt. Cleopatra was lying back on the couch with her feet in Charmian’s lap. Mardian and Iras were sitting by the front of the stage, and Mardian was occasionally strumming his lute (or similar) and singing explosively to make Iras jump, which she did, as well as giggling. It wasn’t a pleasant sound, and Cleopatra soon shut him up. I did wonder, given that she was a queen, why she didn’t have musicians who were more to her liking, but who knows what goes on in the corridors of power? And with the casting emphasising that Cleopatra was Greek rather than Egyptian, I suspected that she may have felt the need to have an Egyptian musician on the payroll to reassure her subjects that she was part of their culture, regardless of her own preferences. I’m not sure if it was Alexas who brought the news about Antony or another messenger, but the dialogue was still good and clear, so this time I heard the lines about the “twenty several messengers”  which made sense of Cleopatra’s following comments. Charmian was so annoying, going on about Julius Caesar instead of praising Mark Antony, and then Cleopatra left to write yet another letter.

Menecrates became Menas for this production, and he and Pompey stood on the balcony for their discussion. Varrius arrived below, and I think Pompey went down one of the ladders to meet him. It was the first time someone had done this, and there was a loud noise as the bar protecting the actors from falling off the balcony was rattled back to give Pompey access to the ladder. This was a minor distraction, and hopefully they’ll find some way to do this more quietly during the previews. I got the gist of this scene, but the dialogue wasn’t as clear as elsewhere.

For the next scene in Rome, a table and some chairs were set up in the middle of the stage. A tray with two carafes and some glasses was placed on the table and someone [Lepidus] poured drinks for the two main guests. A glass of water was placed on the left of the table for Octavius, and a glass containing a red liquid on the right, for Antony. Lepidus and Enobarbus were chatting while this was going on, and then Caesar and Antony arrived, each coming on from their side of the stage and bristling at the other. They moved to the table, and Lepidus, standing by the middle chair, tried to bring them together with his speech. They unbent enough to pronounce the basic civilities, but when Caesar said “sit”, Antony refused, saying “sit, sir”, and they had a mini confrontation over who would sit first. Octavius lost out, and tempers were soon rising again over the rebellion by Fulvia and Antony’s brother. Various matters were raised by Octavius and Antony dealt with them all, rebuffing Enobarbus when he made his comment about borrowing “one another’s love for the instant”. Agrippa’s suggestion of the marriage between Antony and Octavia didn’t seem to be instigated by Octavius this time, and when the question was put to Antony he took his time, draining the wine glass before giving his circumlocutory answer. Again, Lepidus was almost left behind when Octavius and Antony hurried off to Antony’s wedding.

Enobarbus’s description of Cleopatra was well done, and then Octavius, Antony and Octavia entered for a very short scene. One more change to the Liverpool production; CFT had sprung for an extra actress to play Octavia, instead of Pompey having to double the part. The soothsayer was on the balcony, and gave Antony the warnings about Octavius, after which Antony made it clear that this was a political marriage only; he would be back with Cleopatra the first chance he got.

I think the next short scene with Agrippa, Maecenas and Lepidus was dropped, and we were back in Egypt again. Mardian’s music was still not to Cleopatra’s liking, hence her quick change of mind when he turned up with his instrument. The messenger arrived, and had the usual difficulty delivering his message, thanks to Cleopatra’s constant interruptions. When she said “there is gold”, she indicated Alexas who was holding a folder and just looked at her. When she offered more gold, he reacted by shaking his head and turning away – apparently the coffers were empty, or else he was upset that she was squandering her wealth on so many undeserving people; either way it was amusing. Her servants had to haul her off the poor messenger after she heard the bad news, but once she recovered herself she started to show some of the nobility of a queen.

The next scene had Pompey and his men on the balcony and the rest below.  Again, Pompey wasn’t entirely clear, but his emotional reaction to the memory of his “noble father” was. He turned and sobbed for a bit on the back railing, and I was surprised to find that Octavius’s line “take your time”, which sounded like a modern insertion, is actually in the text. Pompey came down a ladder during the dialogue – I think it was when he was spelling out the terms of the proposal – and was on the stage when he and Mark Antony shook hands.

After the leaders left to feast together, Menas and Enobarbus had their private chat which made it clear that Octavius and Antony would be at war before long. The others then returned – the servants’ dialogue was cut – and in all the activity I didn’t see Octavius cleaning the top of the barrel or box he was going to sit on. Fortunately, Steve spotted this action; it’s good to have two pairs of eyes at these times. With his suit and business-like manner, Octavius was well established as a prissy politician, very different from Antony, the grizzled veteran of many a battle. Their difference was emphasised in this scene, with Octavius very reluctant to drink, then not able to keep it down, then standing on the table to announce that he was leaving, then nearly falling off it as he made to leave. Antony helped him down, and it was all nicely done.

The rest of the feast was fine, with Lepidus definitely the worse for wear, and enough reaction from the others to indicate the humour of the crocodile description. Menas took Pompey to the front of the stage for their little chat, and the song may have used the lyrics in the text – I didn’t hear them well enough. I don’t remember the next scene with Ventidius explaining the danger of a lieutenant outperforming his general, although it may not have been clear what was going on; either way, Enobarbus and Agrippa were soon back on stage, making fun of Lepidus and his fawning over Antony and Octavius. Octavia’s leave-taking followed on, and when she broke off her line I thought at first she’d forgotten it, but she was just in character.

Back in Egypt, Cleopatra interrogated the messenger about Octavia. He did his best to please this time, but his guess at Octavia’s age (thirty) was received in stony silence. The rest of his comments made Cleopatra happy and she did a better job of twisting the information to her liking than Malcolm Tucker. Two short scenes showed the start of the conflict between Antony and Octavius; in the first Antony agreed to let Octavia go to Rome to attempt to broker a peace between the two leaders, while in the second Enobarbus and Eros discussed the latest state of play, informing us that Lepidus had been disposed of. These scenes felt bitty, because the changeovers took too long compared to the length of the scene, but they did get across the important information. Octavius and his men were on the balcony while they discussed Mark Antony’s behaviour in Egypt, but Octavius came down one of the ladders once his sister arrived and they took the interval after this scene.

When they restarted, Cleopatra came on dressed for war, arguing with Enobarbus over her participation in the imminent battle. Her armour seemed to consist of a golden breastplate and not much else, and since this piece of equipment was shaped like a naked female chest it was no surprise that Canidius, who arrived with Antony, spent most of the scene staring at the two round bulges in her armour.

Despite the protestations of his men, Antony was determined to fight at sea while Cleopatra seemed more like a bimbo than a queen, supporting her man with no regard for reasoned arguments. The next scenes were also short but as they alternated between the stage and the balcony they seemed to flow better. I also felt that the cast looked more confident in the second half, as if they’d started to get a feel for the space. We learned of Cleopatra’s flight from the battle and that Antony followed her, and then we saw the man himself, discouraged and disheartened, telling his men to take his treasure and leave. As they left, Cleopatra crept on from the back of the stage, wrapped in a black cloak, and again they were reconciled.

The soothsayer rather than the schoolteacher brought Antony’s message to Octavius, who was again on the balcony at this point. Seeing that the man was a foreigner, Octavius leant forward and spoke slowly and loudly, in a patronising manner. It was very funny, and when Octavius had finished with his instructions there was a pause and then Octavius, with prompting, did the anjali mudra (hands held together in front of the chest) to which the soothsayer responded and left. Octavius then sent Proculeius to seduce Cleopatra away from Antony.

In Alexandria, Enobarbus and Cleopatra were joined by Antony and the soothsayer to discuss Octavius’s offer. Thidias arrived to speak to Cleopatra, and she was paying close attention to everything he said while she calculated her best move in the situation. She was only too happy to agree to the idea that Antony had forced her into his bed, and Enobarbus quickly left to inform Antony what was going on. Antony’s rage led to Thidias being whipped by Antony’s men, while Cleopatra kept quiet, observing the scene during Antony’s temper tantrum. She soon had him eating out of her hand again, and when she mentioned “it is my birthday”, Antony clapped his hand to his mouth, the traditional gesture for a man who’s forgotten a woman’s birthday.

Octavius was again reading a letter for the next scene and referred to it as he listed Antony’s insults. I did think he could have gestured elsewhere for the whipped messenger to suggest he’d actually spoken to the man, but it didn’t make much difference overall. Antony’s dismal speech to his servants was fine, and then the soldiers entered both on the balcony and below for the strange music scene, often dropped. Cleopatra helped to put on Antony’s armour next, and managed to buckle on a whole kneepad without breaking a nail.

Again the scenes came thick and fast. Antony learned that Enobarbus had left and sent him his treasure, while Octavius ordered that Antony’s former troops be put in the front of the battle, and as he spoke these lines he looked directly at Enobarbus who had already come on stage and stood below him. Then Enobarbus was told that his treasure had arrived and headed off to die. Antony and his men came on stage, rejoicing at their victory, and when the soldier he commended to Cleopatra was given her hand, he tried to sneak a second kiss but Antony snatched her hand away first – very possessive, this chap.

Enobarbus’s death scene was staged with a shallow sunken area in which he laid himself before dying, so his body was easily removed under cover of darkness. Even shorter scenes now, and the actors hardly had time to leave the stage between them, so dramatic changes of lighting helped to make each scene different. The battle lost, Antony was in a rage (again) with Cleopatra, and she slunk off while he called for Eros.

The road to the monument was along the balcony, with Mardian being sent to give the message of Cleopatra’s death, and when Antony heard this news he went for the assisted suicide option. Unfortunately, while he stood, bracing himself against one of the balcony’s pillars, Eros demonstrated the unassisted suicide option and stabbed himself in the guts. Call me picky if you like, but I don’t believe in the stab-yourself-in-the-guts-and-die-instantly trick. After all, Antony botched his own suicide and lived for quite a lot of lines afterwards, so why shouldn’t Eros?

However, to get back to the play, Antony did his best by jamming the knife into one of the joints of the pillar and then ran onto it, but he wasn’t successful and lay on the ground, groaning. His soldiers refused to finish him off and one of them took Antony’s knife to Octavius – not the actual killing weapon as far as I could see. The next messenger from Cleopatra arrived too late, as usual, and they didn’t seem to make much of this moment which can be quite funny.

When we first saw the set, we reckoned we knew where the monument scene would be played, but as it turned out we were completely wrong. There were two men on the balcony before the scene started; they did some work with wires and hooks and opened up a trapdoor in the balcony floor, but something must have gone wrong because the hooks were taken up again, the trapdoor closed and the men left the balcony, while Cleopatra and her staff came on to the stage from the right hand side. There was just enough of a climb to explain the need to “draw him hither” and they put Antony on a mattress which had been placed on the stage trapdoor. We’re assuming there was some sort of technical hitch tonight, and perhaps we saw Plan B in action; we’ll be interested to see what happens in this scene next time.

They played out the scene on the stage, with Antony held in Cleopatra’s arms till he died. She then said her lines and stayed kneeling beside his body, head down, arms across her chest, unmoving. Her women were concerned that she had died too, but she was just overwhelmed by her loss.

Up on the balcony Octavius was still micro-managing everything, and when Antony’s man turned up with the knife, Octavius was terrified and lunged to the far side of the balcony to stay away from him. Once Octavius realised that Antony was dead he came down the ladder and took the knife himself, wiping it clean before the end of the scene as he invited the soldier who had brought it to go to his tent to hear his version of history. The messenger from Cleopatra was Alexas, and Octavius sent Proculeius to secure Cleopatra for his triumphal march through Rome.

In her Monument, Cleopatra had indeed learned some lessons about the transitory nature of power. Dressed in simple black, she was cool towards Proculeius, though she bowed low to him to demonstrate her submission to Caesar; her women followed her lead. When the Roman guards rushed on, they roughed up the women and stabbed Mardian. When Dolabella arrived, he dismissed Proculeius and the guards and they left, taking Mardian’s dead body with them. Dolabella was much more sympathetic, and Cleopatra soon knew the truth about Octavius’s intentions.

When Octavius himself was announced, Cleopatra and her women all bowed down in a semi-circle with their veils over their faces, making it impossible to tell who was who. Octavius asked “which is the queen of Egypt?”, and Dolabella walked over to stand beside Cleopatra. They included the treasury section, with Alexas as the treasurer, and he handed Octavius a folder which presumably contained the details of Cleopatra’s wealth, or at least those parts she was willing to admit to. Octavius possibly handed the folder back to Cleopatra when he told her “still be’t yours”, but she wasn’t fooled by his charm for all her bowing and sweetness towards him.

The asp basket was brought on by a cheerful chap who just wouldn’t stop talking. He clearly didn’t realise who he was talking to until the end of his dialogue, when he was leaving. Charmian and Iras returned with Cleopatra’s throne, and when he saw this he registered shocked surprise and then hurried off the stage.

Charmian and Iras dressed Cleopatra in the same golden robe she wore at the start, plus her crown – no face mask this time as she needs to speak dialogue. After Iras collapsed, Cleopatra sat on her throne and Charmian placed the basket in front of her. She took the first asp and placed it on her breast, and when she took the second snake she placed it on the other side of her breast so that when she died she was sitting there with her arms folded over her chest. Charmian had to grab the basket quickly after the guard came in, but managed to get the asp out in time, and then Octavius finished the play. I wasn’t sure if the look he gave Dolabella meant that he suspected his involvement in Cleopatra’s death.

There’s more to come with this production, and I’m confident it will be much stronger when we see it again in a couple of weeks’ time. The pace will undoubtedly be quicker, and the cast will be used to the space and be judging their performances better. Tonight they were simply too big, presumably to make sure they carried to the back of the auditorium, but as we found from The Deep Blue Sea last year it’s amazing how well small details can travel in this theatre, and with a play like this which combines the epic and the intimate, this may be just about the perfect space to perform it in. But it was a good start and an enjoyable performance even at this early stage.

© 2012 Sheila Evans at ilovetheatre.me

As You Like It – September 2012

7/10

By William Shakespeare

Directed by James Dacre

Venue: Shakespeare’s Globe

Date: Thursday 6th September 2012

I was reminded that this was a touring production as soon as I saw the set. A low wooden platform sat between the stage pillars, with a wooden crate centre front and a much larger box construction behind it, just in front of the balcony. I could see a door on the near side of this homemade portakabin (with the Shakespeare’s Globe logo on it) and I assumed there would be a door on the other side; I couldn’t see any obvious exits/entrances at the front. Four tall ladders poked up above this box, one on each side and two at the back, and there was some luggage sitting on the top of it – a trunk and a hatbox – which suggested the girls’ flight into the forest. A sturdy wooden post anchored each corner of the front section of the platform, and I could also see an old camera on a tripod on the far side of the stage, complete with its black cloth for the photographer’s head. There was also a small brass bowl just behind the near pillar, a wicker hamper lurking on the far side of the stage, largely hidden by the far pillar, and I spotted another box or hamper secreted behind the portakabin on our side of the stage. My eyesight wasn’t up to identifying a small dark shape beside the far front post – no doubt that will become clear in time. Nothing else was visible at this point, and the stage proper had been cut back to its usual size, with steps at each side and two lots at the front about level with the corners of the platform. The costumes were all late Victorian.

The black thing turned out to be the flash gun for the camera, but that came later. To begin with, most of the actors in the cast came out of the box from the portakabin’s side doors, apart from a few who appeared through trapdoors in the roof. They played assorted instruments, not the most harmonious sound, and sang a made-up song to introduce the performance. Touchstone also did a short speech as part of this, and even took a quick turn around the pit during it, which helped to get the audience involved. I didn’t catch all of the words, but there was a fair bit of laughter, so not a bad start.

During the opening song, the cast had brought on the wooden box from behind the portakabin, and I could see it contained apples. At the end of the song, the non-openers stood on stage holding an apple in each hand and gradually raised them up, presumably to represent the orchard setting of the first scene. As Orlando and Adam got the scene underway, the others placed the apples on the ground and left the stage, which allowed Orlando to pick up the fruit and put it in the box during the scene.

For once the dialogue was wonderfully clear and I heard every syllable of these scenes; since the portakabin blocked half the stage and the pillars just about did for the rest, hearing this play was our only hope. Old Adam was doubled with Touchstone, so not only was he wearing a hat and brown coat, he also had tremors in his hands to indicate how old he was. Orlando introduced us to his own situation, and when his brother approached from the pit they had a mighty tussle (behind the pillars) which Orlando definitely won – I glimpsed Oliver kneeling down at one point. Charles the wrestler also approached from the audience but he took a lot longer to reach the stage, using the pretty route to deliver most of his ‘news’. Oliver gave him a banknote as inducement to kill Orlando for him, and I noticed he kissed the rest of the notes before he put them back – mercenary or what? Charles took the hint, and I reflected that his career was almost over, given his promise to quit the ring if Orlando walked away from their fight. Oliver’s description of his hatred for his brother was nicely done and I thought it was worthy of some laughs; not so the audience.

Rosalind and Celia used the camera at the start of their scene. Rosalind was carrying a lily and was handed some grapes to hold in an aesthetic pose while Celia placed the camera on the platform to take her picture. Their conversation was also very clear and for once Celia not only came across as Rosalind’s equal, she was even stronger than her in this scene. When Rosalind suggested they fall in love, she sat Celia down on her knee (I assume she was kneeling herself to do this). Touchstone’s arrival changed the tone, and I could see that the women were keen to make use of his wit to cheer themselves up. Le Beau delivered his message, and then the stage was set up for the wrestling match by threading a rope through the eyes on the corner posts and drawing it tight. The women disappeared off and reappeared on the other side of the stage, Rosalind with a hat and Celia with an umbrella, presumably formal wear for ladies of rank attending wrestling matches. But they were all over the stage during this scene, and when Orlando arrived and stripped off his shirt, they were all over the stage in more ways than one. This Celia was definitely attracted to Orlando as much as Rosalind was, and it was touch and go as to which one would get to him first.

The wrestling took a while, and Orlando was definitely getting the worse of it for a long time. He was banged against the portakabin and fell over the rope onto the front of the stage but still managed to recover and get back into the fight, delivering some nasty blows to Charles and even kicking him in a sensitive spot when Charles was finally on the floor himself. Despite his wrestler being beaten,the Duke was very pleased until he found out who Orlando was. The Duke had taken a bag, which presumably contained the prize money, and was about to hand it over when Orlando announced his parentage. The Duke froze, kept the money and left soon afterwards, clearly angry.

Orlando then had his two ‘conversations’ with Celia and Rosalind. Celia was the first to congratulate him, coming into the wrestling ring to do so, but Rosalind swept past her and gave her chain to Orlando, much to Celia’s annoyance. Orlando, of course, was mute. With Celia beginning to accept that Orlando wasn’t for her, she and Rosalind left the stage by the front steps, getting almost to the exit before Rosalind came out with her pathetic excuse that he’d called them back. It was very funny, and with a courtier watching this going on, I was aware that these actions prompted the Duke’s banishment of Rosalind because he didn’t want his daughter to be led astray by people he regarded as his enemies.

Rosalind’s passion for Orlando was well expressed in the next scene, followed by the Duke’s anger and her banishment. The latter part of the scene was mostly hidden but they got the story across well enough, and again the planning of their flight showed Celia to be at least as strong a character as her cousin. When choosing their noms de fuite, Celia took a little time to get out the “alien” part, then hastily added the “a” to make it sound more plausible, which we found very funny. Orlando was likewise soon on his travels, with the faithful Adam as his companion; I think this happened before the first scene in the forest, but I’m not sure.

Moving on to the first forest scene, where the banished Duke could have been his usurping brother’s twin, we were shown Jacques (played by Emma Pallant as a female character) up on the roof of the portakabin, where she acted out her part while the First Lord (no idea who was doing this bit) recounted the story of Jacques’ musings on the injured deer. Emma spoke Jacques’ own lines for this, so we were familiar with who was playing the part before her proper entrance – a good move with such unusual casting.

I think this may have been the first place where an actor changed character on stage, with Duke Senior turning into Duke Frederick before our very eyes and finding out about his daughter’s flight. The text has the Orlando/Adam scene here – maybe, maybe not – then Rosalind, Celia and Touchstone turned up in Arden and the fun really began.

They were carrying suitcases and Touchstone was also carrying Celia on his back. Ganymede was in workman’s clothes, with a short, waistcoat, rough trousers and a cap, while Celia wore a plain frock. Touchstone was still in his lime green suit, a sight for sore eyes (to make them sore, that is). Corin and Silvius entered by the side stairs and sat chatting in the front corner of the stage on our side; to hide from them the three new arrivals crouched behind the suitcases. Silvius was wonderfully silly, while Touchstone’s comments on the folly of lovers came across very clearly.

After Corin took them away to the sheepcote, I think the next scene started with Amiens singing Under The Greenwood Tree; I forget the style, but it was very pleasant. While this was going on, Jacques sat front right on the steps, irritated by the noise and studying or writing in her notebook. Her discourse with Amiens was nicely brittle, and she gave the impression of being an unhappy woman who had turned cynical rather than being a cynic by nature. The short scene with Orlando bringing Adam into the forest may have come before the singing, but either way Adam was left propped up against the ladder on the portakabin roof while Orlando went to find food. I forgot to mention that, at an earlier point, some panels on the front of the portakabin were swung back to reveal a forest scene, with double doors for access to the stage.

Duke Senior returned to the stage which now had a picnic laid out on a blanket. Jacques also returned, all excited at having met a fool in the forest, and her description of the encounter was very well done. Orlando came through the doors, as I recall, and threatened them with his knife. He grabbed Jacques and held the knife to her throat, which made him seem much more ruthless than usual. He was soon persuaded by the Duke to soften his approach, and after he left to get Adam, Jacques gave us the famous “seven ages of man” speech. It was strange hearing it from a woman, and it gave a more observational flavour to the familiar lines. With Orlando’s parentage acknowledged, the scene was over and they took the interval, with Jacques hanging a sign to that effect on the portakabin door handles.

Act 3 scene 1 may have started the second half, or it may have happened earlier or later; I’m usually happy for directors to change the order of events, but it does give me problems writing these notes at times. The stage had been well papered during the interval, with sheets on the pillars, the posts, the doors, just about everywhere you could stick a sheet of paper. Touchstone sat on the portakabin roof for the first part of his chat with Corin, but came down during it to complete the scene. When Rosalind arrived, he made good use of the audience when composing the string of rhyming couplets; we joined in with “Rosalind” each time. When it came to “must find love’s prick, and Rosalind”, he introduced a long pause while he fumbled in his trousers for a rather squashed rose, then continued the verse; some folk had kept the rhythm going and said “Rosalind” anyway, but we also joined in at the appropriate time.

Celia and Rosalind’s conversation went pretty well and then Orlando turned up with Jacques in tow. The two of them were awkward company and Jacques soon left, which allowed Rosalind to confront Orlando and begin the reverse wooing. I saw very little of the action of this scene, but the dialogue was clear, and there were some laughs which suggested the reactions and business were good fun. Celia sat on the bench during most of this.

Touchstone’s’ wooing of Audrey was next, and again the casting was unusual. John O’Mahony was fine as the fraternal Dukes, but wouldn’t have been most people’s first choice as Audrey. The beard would have put off many a casting director, but once we got over that, his pretty frock and feminine charms completely won us over. Sir Oliver Martext was as drunk as a skunk and played very little part in the proceedings, staggering off the stage some moments after the rest of the wedding party had left.

Rosalind was very put out that Orlando had missed his appointment, and Celia was doing her best to convince her cousin that Orlando was indeed faithless. The encounter with Silvius and Phebe was good fun. Emma Pallant was doubling Phebe with Jacques, and she played both parts very strongly. At the end of that scene she changed into Jacques on stage and continued immediately to talk with Ganymede. I had the impression that Jacques was also attracted to this woman-as-man, and that her unhappiness at Orlando’s arrival was partly because he interrupted their conversation.

The second wooing between the two of them went well enough, with Rosalind being very changeable. They may have had a song in the interlude and then Silvius brought the letter from Phebe. After revealing the contents of the letter, Rosalind sent him packing just as Oliver arrived with the bloody napkin. I couldn’t see all of Celia’s behaviour at this point, but she was clearly taken with this new arrival. When Rosalind fainted, Oliver definitely found out that she was a woman, and Steve reckoned he also realised that she had to be Rosalind (he does know about the flight of Rosalind and Celia after all). I wasn’t sure about that part, and I also wasn’t sure how much Orlando knew later on, but that might have been clearer from a better angle than ours.

With a cast limited in number, William was unavailable for comment in this production, so they went straight into Orlando and Oliver’s conversation followed by Rosalind’s arrival. The quartet with Silvius and Phebe was nicely done, then they skipped the following song and continued with the Duke’s entrance for the wedding scene. Jacques had to miss the wedding, as Phebe was present in her white dress; in fact all the brides wore a similar dress – probably not much choice in the forest’s one and only bridal shop. Audrey was also present, as a life-size cardboard cut-out, and we really enjoyed her performance despite the lack of action. Touchstone carried her on and left on the right corner of the stage, then came across later to tell her to “bear your body more seeming, Audrey”, which was very funny. He also took Audrey off at the end to clear the stage for the dance.

With Jacques missing they dropped Touchstone’s quarrel routine (shame) so in no time at all Rosalind was back in her wedding dress, ready to marry the man she loves. The news about Duke Frederick’s conversion arrived, and with some slipping of coats on and off Jacques finished her part in the play, leaving the rest, including Phebe, to end the show with a happy dance. No epilogue.

It was a lively performance, with some interesting choices and a strong and clear story. There was also a good deal of humour, including some from the invasion of the pigeons! So many of them were landing on the stage that Touchstone had to chase them off before continuing with his lines. At some point he also encouraged us to keep clapping after some business or other; then he told us to stop, then to keep it up – it was all good fun. I would have liked to have seen more of the action, but we did get a good idea of the production despite our side-on view, and I thought the entire cast did an excellent job. There was more music than I’ve commented on, sometimes discordant, sometimes pleasant, and the cast’s interaction with the audience was very good. Their touring venues have been informal, from the looks of them, so presumably they’ve had plenty of practice.

© 2012 Sheila Evans at ilovetheatre.me

Comedy Of Errors – August 2012

8/10

By William Shakespeare

Directed by Amir Nizar Zuabi

Venue: RST

Date: Thursday 23rd August 2012

This was great fun tonight. We thought this production had potential when we saw it in preview, and they’ve proved us right. There were a few changes and some things which I saw for the first time from our new angle, while the dialogue was much clearer than before.

There were no changes to the set as far as I could see. [Having checked my earlier notes again, I think the two bollards at the top of the raised ramp at the back had disappeared by this time. Either that or I just couldn’t see them from my position.] The opening scene was likewise the same, and although some people laughed at the violence, I found it unenjoyable. It did get the story of the twins across quite well though, which is important. When the crates arrived at the dock, I spotted Dromio of Ephesus passing through the scene this time, and being chased off by the dock workers.

When he returned to summon his master, as he thought, to dinner, his hand gestures were even more persistent than before. He kept moving them from pointing in Antipholus’s direction round to the far exit, encouraging him to go. It was very funny, although I did wonder if it was getting in the way of the scene a bit, as I wasn’t listening to Antipholus so much. Still, I love the two Dromios in this, so I’m loath to criticise their comic business.

The same three illegal immigrants came out of the other crate, though this time the woman offered Antipholus the track suits and then the bags – no sale. Again this business interrupted the dialogue a lot, and risked losing the energy as well, but they kept it going just fine.

Adriana and Luciana were good, with their dialogue being much clearer, apart from the time when Adriana stuck her napkin in Luciana’s mouth to stop her wittering on about marriage when she’s still a spinster. Dromio leapt up on to the struts of the ceiling to avoid Adriana’s wrath, and I forgot to mention last time that she took a cupcake off the stand on the table after Dromio had gone and smashed it into her face when she was talking about losing her beauty.

When Antipholus of Syracuse met his own Dromio in the next scene, he took his jacket off to be able to beat him the better, and handed it to Dromio to hold. It was dropped on the ground at some point, and later Dromio picked it up to put it back on his master, only to start with the wrong sleeve. When he did get the sleeve right, he failed to get it on Antipholus’s arm, so the whole jacket slid over his shoulders. Antipholus took it off Dromio and put it on himself, just before Adriana and Luciana arrived. (They cut the lines after “purchase me another dry basting”.) I noticed that Adriana threw her lovely coat with a fur collar down on the stage after she arrived, but almost immediately picked it up and gave it to Luciana to hold; care of one’s clothes seems to be a theme of this production.

We’d heard from Kirsty Bushell that she did some business to suggest that Adriana noticed some changes in her husband – the Antipholi are very different in height – and we spotted these tonight. She’s also playing Olivia in Twelfth Night, and one of the directors had told her that when her characters see the other twin, they are in such a needy place that they overlook what’s obvious to the rest of us. It’s a fair point, though not quite enough to cover the discrepancies in these productions, but we managed to overlook the problem so as to enjoy ourselves more.

The look of puzzlement between Antipholus and Dromio got the laugh that normally comes on “plead you to me, fair dame?”, which is fair enough, and Dromio almost fell in the water trying to get away when Antipholus was angry with him over Adriana’s confirmation of his earlier encounter with Dromio of Ephesus – “for even her very words thou didst deliver to me on the mart”. When Antipholus and Adriana kissed, Luciana looked away, embarrassed, while Dromio seemed more concerned about being beaten again. The door was hoisted onto the stage, and although I didn’t find the opening scene funny, I did laugh at the slapstick when Dromio was hit by the door, twice.

With the Syracusan pair safely installed in the Ephesian house, Adriana’s real husband turned up with his mates for dinner. The scene was as before, though we had a better view of some aspects from the side. The two Dromios looked through the letterbox at one point and both backed off rapidly from the door, scared by what they saw. I didn’t see much of Nell this time until she chased Dromio of Syracuse off the stage with a large squash. After Antipholus of Ephesus left, his Dromio chased after him carrying the “iron crow” he’d asked for. I foresee another beating when he catches up with his master; he interpreted that instruction by bringing a weather vane with a crow on top of it.

The scene between Antipholus of Syracuse and Luciana was OK, and certainly made it clear that Luciana fancied this Antipholus a lot. The following section, with Dromio relating Nell’s attributes, was very entertaining, and then we just had the delivery of the chain by Angelo and the capture and shooting of the other illegal immigrant before the interval. This time the captain offered his gun to Antipholus to shoot the man, but he ran off in a panic, naturally enough. The lights went out before the shot, as before, and although the audience took a little while to realise it was time for applause, we dished out plenty when the penny dropped.

It was a brisk first half, and the second opened with the disposing of the dead body – no improvement there.  Then followed the scene with Angelo in danger of being arrested over the money he owed to a merchant. When Antipholus of Ephesus arrived, they argued over who had the chain, and at one point the goldsmith was so stressed he had to use his inhaler. When Dromio of Syracuse arrived, he was carrying a lifejacket and had a bright orange life preserver round his neck – very funny.

The next scene had Adriana dunking Luciana in another goldfish tank; I assume no fish were harmed in this production, even though Steve spotted Luciana spitting one out when she lifted her head out of the water. This time the water torture was funny, especially when Adriana dunked her own head in there at the end. The platform was still suspended for this scene, but apart from a few spins and Dromio of Syracuse being nervous about stepping off it, it didn’t add much.

When the platform was being winched on and off again, they covered the scene change with some business, usually having the band troop across the stage. For this change they also laid out some barrels and rolled Antipholus of Syracuse across them. When the others left, Antipholus was balancing on one remaining barrel, holding a bag (as provided by the woman from the crate) and for some unknown reason a scrap of green cloth. He delivered the lines well enough, but he could have done it just as well standing on the ground.

When he did get down, we noticed he placed the bag under the barrel to stop it rolling down the stage. The courtesan was much the same, but one thing I forgot to mention before was that after the Syracusans left, and when she was planning to visit Adriana, she took the padding out of her bra – four separate pieces – and threw them behind her. This got a good laugh. When Dromio of Ephesus passed across the stage, he was carrying a big bundle of rope – we know what he’s going to do with that – and when she threw her shoe at him tonight she almost hit him. This is a dangerous production for the male actors with the women being so violent; even the Madonna has hit someone in passing.

Speaking of which, Adriana dealt with the officer by twisting his arm behind his back, and after the abbess had dealt with Adriana’s attack by crushing her fist in her hand, both the officer and another chap leapt out of her way when she went back into the abbey, all very funny. In general, the scenes through to the final confrontations in front of the abbey were good fun with no significant changes to report. There was a strong response to the merchant, the one to whom Angelo owed money, taking out a machete to fight Antipholus of Syracuse. When Dromio of Ephesus confirmed that his master had not dined at home, he revealed to Adriana that they had dined with the courtesan. Her story had been that Antipholus had rushed into her house and stolen her ring, but now Adriana knew the truth she was not a happy bunny – that was what led to her slamming the courtesan’s head against the oil drum. She also pulled down the hem of the courtesan’s skirt earlier as it had been riding much too high, entirely intentional on the courtesan’s part. The rest was as before. I sniffled, I laughed, and the ending was just as good as the last time.

There were a few new bits of business that I find hard to place. Nell came running across the stage after Dromio of Syracuse who had just left, crying “Dromio, Dromio, wherefore are thou Dromio?” which was very funny. But then Dromio of Ephesus came on stage, spotted her leaving and rushed after her saying “shakalaka” or some such vocalisation of desire. During another of the scene changes, the woman from the crate wheeled her shopping trolley onto the stage and was selling to the citizens. Dromio of Ephesus and his Nell wandered on and were looking at the goods – presumably he was going to buy her a present – but the police came along and the woman, along with everyone else, was off like a shot. When Angelo was talking about the chain to Antipholus of Ephesus, he tried to mollify Antipholus’s anger by repeating some of the  tune they’d been singing earlier, to no effect.

This production has really come together. There’s still too much unnecessary violence and tricksy staging for my liking, but the cast have overcome all of that to tell the story really well and provide us with a lot of humour along the way. The two Dromios are still the best thing in it, but the others have caught up a lot, and they deserve to play to packed houses. Good luck to them.

© 2012 Sheila Evans at ilovetheatre.me

King John – August 2012

8/10

By William Shakespeare

Directed by Maria Aberg

Venue: Swan Theatre, Stratford

Date: Wednesday 22nd August 2012

Our experience tonight was much better than last time, and there were several reasons for this. Firstly, the performances had come on a lot since May which was to be expected, although the seven week layoff (barring one performance) could have been a problem. Secondly we heard an excellent talk this afternoon by Robert Maslan about the play, and although he based it on the regular text rather than this production, we learned more details which helped in our understanding. Our position was different too, which helped, and of course we knew this time that we weren’t seeing the usual version of the text, so we could relax and enjoy this interpretation without getting hung up on the casting or the set.

The opening was the same, but as we’d also had a session with Pippa Nixon this morning I’m afraid we Summer Scholars got a bit carried away with Land Of Hope And Glory and nearly ruined the entrance of the court. The Bastard’s ukulele playing hasn’t improved much, I’m sad to say. John did the same little tease with the crown as before, and again ignored the French ambassador for a while before listening to him. When the bastard Falconbridge and her brother came on, Pippa started to use her feminine charms to win the argument, unzipping her top and displaying her cleavage to good advantage (as she had done last time), but although John noticed her looks, the sexual attraction between them was kept in check most of the time which allowed the other aspects of their relationship to be explored much more, and overall I felt that helped the performance.

In front of Angiers, the wrangling between the two sides was clearer this time. The citizens stood round the balcony and spoke in unison, first to declare their allegiance to the King of England, then to point out that they didn’t know who that was, and then to put forward the suggestion that Blanche and the Dauphin marry to create peace between France and England. I didn’t spot when Constance and Arthur left this scene; probably during the general exit before the townsfolk made their marriage proposal. From our position tonight I could see Blanche and Louis sitting on the steps while this talk was going on, and I had a much clearer view of their incompetent wooing. Louis was totally self-regarding, seeing himself when he looked in her eyes, while her lines were delivered so jerkily that it was impossible to tell whether she liked the Dauphin or not, as was intended.

Again Elinor had to prompt John with a cough to add Anjou to the list of provinces in Blanche’s dowry, and again she held her hand to her head in reaction to him giving away thirty thousand marks as well. The bargain was sealed with a chest bump between the two kings, and then they partied. The court posed on the steps as before, and following today’s talk the “commodity” speech came over much better. When John brought out the microphone he started speaking the line “the moment I wake up”, then began singing with the next line “before I put on my makeup”. The King of France carried on, and then everyone joined in. Soon Blanche and Louis were holding the microphones and stood facing each other on a couple of the benches. Their song wasThe Time Of My Life, and really got the crowd rocking, especially with their Dirty Dancing routine.

Eventually the party moved off stage and Constance, accompanied by Arthur, Salisbury and Pembroke, came on (Pembroke is an addition to my text). Her grief was more like anger, which helped to keep the energy levels up. I’ve often found her whining rather dreary in past productions, by Susie Trayling was very good in this role, and kept me watching and listening for once.

The party returned, coming on from both sides at the top of the stairs. Not seeing Constance at first, Philip was very happy and announced a new French public holiday. Then he and John, arms on each other’s shoulders, turned and walked down the steps, to be confronted by a very angry woman. Oops. I did like the extra party hats, especially the clown’s hat worn by Austria which rather undercut his macho attempts to stop the Bastard insulting him, and we both appreciated the devil’s horns which Elinor had chosen to wear on her head.

Fortunately the Pope’s legate, Pandulph, arrived to speak to John about releasing the Archbishop of Canterbury. Unfortunately, John decided not to cooperate with the Holy Father’s request, and was excommunicated. Philip struggled to find a way out of his predicament; he didn’t want to lose the new-found peace by going to war against England, but the threat of being excommunicated himself was too much to resist. Blanche’s situation was no better; she was now connected to both sides, and would lose either way. I wasn’t particularly moved by any of the performances tonight, but the one that came closest was this, when Blanche expressed her divided loyalties and the suffering this was causing her. She went with Louis, but was never happy again.

After introducing us to Austria’s head, the Bastard took on Hubert’s role, meaning that Essex had to take on the Bastard’s job of raising money in England. When suborning the Bastard to kill young Arthur, John first gave him his own silver dog tags to wear, which the Bastard was proud to receive. The sexual attraction got in the way of this scene first time round; it was better tonight without such distractions.

The next scene with the French included Blanche as well, though being without dialogue she sat on the steps and said nothing. Constance was excellent in this scene, with all her arguments coming across clearly. After she left, followed by King Philip, Pandulph began to manipulate Louis into attacking England in order to claim the throne by right of his marriage to Blanche. This caused Blanche’s only reaction in this scene – she stood up when Pandulph first made this suggestion, not happy at the prospect of war between France and England.

The attempt at blinding Arthur was OK; I heard quite a lot of the lines, and I’d been aware since this morning’s talk how often eyes and sight were mentioned in this play, but the main point of the scene in this version was to show the change in the Bastard’s attitude to King John. When the Bastard led Arthur off they took the interval, and again there were fewer seats occupied in the second half, though it wasn’t as obvious as with Troilus And Cressida last week.

The second half started with another song from the Bastard, and during it John appeared at the top of the stairs. (I haven’t been able to track down the lyrics – something about keeping baby teeth in a drawer with jewellery.) Again he placed his crown on his own head and stood there while she sang. When the song was finished, the balloons were released, along with lots of confetti which landed on the audience as well. The Bastard dragged the microphone stand off after looking at John on the steps; I wondered if this was meant to reflect her change of attitude.

John’s discussion with Salisbury and Pembroke was interrupted by the Bastard, and from the lords’ comments it was clear that they had heard of the King’s intent to kill Arthur and that the Bastard had been chosen to carry out the murder. The announcement of Arthur’s death was no surprise to these men, and after they left John received the news of the Dauphin’s army, his mother’s death and Constance’s death, while from the Bastard, resuming her non-Hubert shape, he heard of the unrest in the country. John was not a happy bunny. He ranted at the Bastard for misinterpreting his commands, but then she showed him the very order which he had signed. He next complained that she hadn’t prevented this mistake on his part, and frankly I wanted to shout ‘man up’ at the little wimp. After a bit of rough-housing, he had the Bastard on her back and was viciously grabbing at her crotch, but she managed to get away and finally admitted, Hubert-like, that she hadn’t done the deed. Relief all round, and John sent the Bastard running off to tell the peers.

Meanwhile, at the castle Arthur was making his escape. The walls were high and slippery, and with the lights lowered he had difficulty making his way to safety. They staged this differently according to my earlier notes. Arthur came down the steps some way, saying his lines, then another Arthur edged out along the top. They reflected each other’s positions, facing in opposite directions, then fell down, one behind the steps and the other onto the ground. With the balloons hiding the body, it was quite plausible that the lords could come on, discussing their meeting with the French, and not see the corpse until well into the scene. Of course with the Bastard and Hubert being one and the same, the lines were rearranged considerably, and the long dialogue between the two characters was severely cut. When Salisbury drew his ‘sword’, the Bastard drew her gun, which was funny, and being a woman she couldn’t actually pick up the dead boy; she cradled him in her arms, and his corpse walked off stage later when the next scene was under way.

The rapprochement between John and Pandulph was next. John came to the front of the stage and took off his shirt, then knelt down with his coronet over his praying hands, facing Pandulph who had come down the steps. She asserted her authority over him by staying well back, so he had to shuffle towards her on his knees, then bowed right down before her. When she lifted up his hands to remove the crown, he held on to it briefly, as if loath to let it go, but released it eventually. As soon as he’d been crowned (again) he became all business-like, telling the legate to hurry and stop the French army, while Pandulph was confident that what she had started she could stop. The Bastard reported the latest information to the king, including Arthur’s actual death, and was incensed to hear of yet another compromise, on this occasion with the Church. This time, I was aware of John giving the Bastard authority to run things. I also spotted that the ‘For God and England’ neon sign at the back was flickering and losing some of its letters, another indication that the country was going to rack and ruin.

When Louis met with the English lords, Blanche was present again, but only just. I don’t know what she’d been taking, alcohol or drugs or both, but she looked terrible. Her marriage wasn’t turning out well for her, and I wondered if, like Lady Anne in Richard III, she wouldn’t be long for this world. When Pandulph turned up, she learned that it wasn’t so easy to stop a war as to start one, and with the Bastard making defiant declarations it looked like there might be a battle after all.

King John was with his son, Prince Henry, when he felt ill and had to go to Swinstead Abbey. The next three scenes were trimmed to the essentials only, and played out in a repeating fashion from the balconies. John was down below, watching these events, as if he was being given the news while his fevered mind tried to make sense of it. The Bastard said the lines “Show me the very wound of this ill news: I am no woman. I’ll not swoon at it” (unfortunate, given that she was a woman), the French reported their lost supplies and the changing allegiance of the English, the French count Melun warned the English lords that the Dauphin meant to kill them after the victory was won, and these sections were repeated several times. This phase was brought to a conclusion by the reply to the Bastard, informing us that the king had been poisoned. Then things got even more surreal.

The king sat on one of the benches, clearly unwell. This went on for a bit, then he got up, the music started and he began to do a dance routine, looking like he was fine. He went through the routine a couple of times so we could see what it was meant to look like, then he began to suffer, as did the dancing, and finally he staggered to the steps and collapsed there, reaching towards the bottles of champagne – partying to the end. The Bastard arrived as did Prince Henry, and with a few speeches from the final scene, the king finally died. The Bastard hugged him, wept, and looked more distressed than the young prince, who took up the crown and held it till the end. The Bastard closed the play with the familiar speech, and I found myself pondering that England had indeed been conquered, by William, and not that long before. Still, it was a good ending, and we were much happier at the end of this performance than last time.

Once again, having consulted the text, I’m aware that this was only a version of the play, and a much adulterated version to boot. The production hung together well enough in its own terms, but I wasn’t moved by any of the characters, and while the female Bastard/Hubert seemed to work better this time around, I’m not convinced it’s a helpful interpretation overall. Pippa Nixon’s excellent performance made a difference, and she and Alex Waldmann came on to take some bows together tonight, which seemed appropriate. His performance as John was very good, and I hope the RSC will find more work for him to do in the future (we already know that Pippa is coming back to give us Rosalind and Ophelia). Credit to the rest of the cast as well; they worked well together and that’s vital for a good performance.

We’re not usually concerned to see ‘traditional’ Shakespeare – as if there was such a thing – but I’d certainly prefer see a production of this play which sticks more to the text than they did tonight. The similarities with modern times were reasonably appropriate, and the energy and humour were good fun, but we still felt there was something lacking, that the production wasn’t as meaty as it could have been. I do hope other actresses can find this level of anger and passion in the Constance role though; it really helps the performance to have that character played so strongly. But now that we’ve had the Complete Works and World Shakespeare Festivals, perhaps they’ll return to doing this play less frequently; we’ll see.

© 2012 Sheila Evans at ilovetheatre.me

Richard III – August 2012

7/10

By William Shakespeare

Directed by Roxana Silbert

Venue: Swan Theatre

Date: Tuesday 21st August 2012

This was another strange performance, the first after a three week break while Troilus And Cressida had its run. They had a line run in the afternoon, which would account for their dialogue being crystal clear for the most part (Stanley was the notable exception – his lines were less understandable than before!) but the energy petered out after a good start, leading to a relatively lacklustre performance. There were some distractions tonight; Steve had to leave during Clarence’s dream speech as his cough wouldn’t behave itself and some teenagers on the left side of the stage were very fidgety during the second half, leafing through programs and the like, which didn’t help. But mostly the pace was just a fraction too slow, and I suspect they needed this performance to get back fully into their stride.

Jonjo was accessing more of the dark aspects of the play this time, though not as much as I would have liked. I heard the conversation between Clarence and Richard in full tonight, and understood the political implications much better. I could also see Clarence’s reactions as Richard commented on Mistress Shore; he smiled and almost laughed a few times at Richard’s bitchiness.

On to Act 3 scene 1, and some points I forgot from the previous performance. Buckingham tilted the Cardinal’s hat after accusing him of being “too senseless-obstinate”, and flicked back the corners of his cape. When Buckingham was briefing Catesby for his errand to Hastings, he wheeled forward the throne for Catesby to sit on, which he did, savouring the experience.

The scrivener was also hard to understand this time, while Catesby sat amongst the audience after his initial contributions to the wooing of Richard so that he could respond as part of the crowd. Richard’s parting kiss to the ex-queen Elizabeth was really unpleasant, and she was holding herself very stiffly so as to avoid the contact as much as possible. Richard said “relenting fool” before she’d walked away from him, but kept the rest of that speech till she’d gone.

Anne spat at Richard again during the ghost sequence, and the young Edward briefly stood between Richard and Richmond when they were fighting. I forgot to mention before that when Richmond was strangling Richard at the end, echoing the way Richard tried to strangle the young Duke of York earlier, Richard took off his coronet and hit Richmond with it a few times before finally dying. It was a funny gesture, and appropriate given the way they staged the ghost sequence.

Apart from the greater clarity, that was about it for tonight. It still feels like a good production, and the cast certainly look like they’re all working well together now.

© 2012 Sheila Evans at ilovetheatre.me

Much Ado About Nothing – August 2012

9/10

By William Shakespeare

Directed by Iqbal Khan

Venue: Courtyard Theatre

Date: Monday 20th August 2012

There’s been a huge improvement in this production since we saw it last. The timing of the scene changes is quicker, and the whole cast is working very well together. I don’t know if the accents had been modified or whether we were more used to them, but the dialogue was clearer, and although I only noticed a few specific cuts, the running time was down to three hours (from three and a half!). Our angle tonight was different too, so I saw some things I hadn’t noticed before, while losing one or two other things. There’s a truly magic feel to the performance, and with a packed audience responding warmly to the action it was a tremendous evening.

No real changes to report for the pre-show business or the early scenes, although I spotted that Hero deliberately managed to bump into Claudio before she left with the rest of the household. Don John was also present when Don Pedro returned to Benedick and Claudio. He stayed skulking by the front steps; after Benedick left, he received a pointed look from his brother and reluctantly went through the doors at the back, closing them with sarcastic precision. Dogberry and Borachio came on stage to remove the fan which had been working throughout the opening scene, and took it to the back of the stage before finally removing it altogether. Dogberry didn’t have long to tell Antonio what he’d heard before Antonio reported it to Leonato, dismissing Dogberry at the same time.

After Don John’s scene, Beatrice, Hero, Ursula and Margaret came through the audience and onto the stage at the front, singing and wearing the soldier’s jackets. Leonato and Antonio came through the doors to meet them, and after some chat they were dressed up in the scarves, ready for the party. The conversations at the party were easier to see from this angle, although the continuing music made them harder to hear. The prince and Hero appeared on the balcony during the dance, celebrating, while Claudio came across more clearly as immature tonight; his petulance at what he thought the prince had done – wooing Hero for himself instead of Claudio – was a childish reaction, and there was every possibility that he would grow out of such tantrums in time.

We had learned from the director that kissing in front of one’s elders is still frowned upon in India, so when Beatrice told Hero to stop Claudio’s “mouth with a kiss”, Leonato intervened and Hero and Claudio stayed apart. Again Don John’s scene had no changes to report, and then Benedick arrived on stage for the first gulling scene. His delivery of the speech “I do much wonder that one man….” was a bit better than before, but still lacked the detail of previous productions, and only got a laugh at the very end. Balthazar sang as before, and the servant who was bringing Benedick his book was persuaded to join in the dancing. She was much too vigorous, and Claudio backed off when she started hitting him with her scarf. Benedick was up on the roof again tonight, but he was visible (just) and the maid’s antics helped the scene along, as Benedick doesn’t actually have any lines for a fair chunk of it. At the end of the scene, when Benedick was assessing the ‘revelations’ he’d just heard, he kept bending down to put one shoe on, then leaving it to speak another line. He managed to get them both on before Beatrice came to call him in to dinner.

The gulling of Beatrice was done as before, with Hero’s lines still a bit muffled by the speaker on the mobile. Verges spotted Beatrice, who had slid round to sit beside her, after the line “Yet tell her of it: hear what she will say”, and so her “O! do not do your cousin such a wrong” was said with Beatrice right beside her. Beatrice put her finger to her lips to tell Verges to be quiet at “His excellence did earn it, ere he had it”, which explained Verges’ sudden change of subject.

Benedick was brought on to the stage for the next scene by Dogberry, who seemed to be the very barber talked of a short while later. The prince made much of not recognising Benedick, and his appearance was very different. The interval was taken after Don John’s assertion of Hero’s disloyalty, which meant the wedding platform could be set up during the interval, saving a good deal of time.

The second half still started with Beatrice singing “Sigh no more” on the balcony, with Dogberry on guard down below. This was followed by the first part of the watch scene, up to Dogberry’s final exit. Then came the first part of the wedding preparations, up to the conclusion of Margaret’s jest about “the heavier for a husband”. Then Borachio and Conrad had their conversation and were arrested by the watch, after which Beatrice turned up and completed the scene with Hero and Margaret. Dogberry and Verges showed the two pairs of trousers to Leonato as before, and then we had the wedding scene.

I wasn’t aware of any changes to this, but our view of the action was much better. The guests were brought up from the audience as before, and Beatrice and Benedick were startled to find themselves giving garlands to each other. We clapped along to the music as everyone arrived and thoroughly enjoyed ourselves. The microphone was still being used, and the way it was being passed around, or rather grabbed by various people, was very funny. The Panditji moved over to the corner of the stage at “Stand thee by,” with one of the servants bringing over the stool that proved so awkward last time. I’m not sure if Benedick sat down on it tonight, so the people sitting over that way may have suffered less than we did.

The rest of the scene was as before, just clearer, and the scene between Beatrice and Benedick was just as strong. The examination of Borachio and Conrade was followed by the clearing of the wedding platform and the cloth streamers, which worked better tonight although it was still slow. Leonato and Antonio managed their lines without the servants’ activities being so distracting, and I’m sure they got the stage cleared a line or two earlier this time.

Antonio took off one of his shoes and used it to attack Claudio, in lieu of a proper challenge. Claudio threw the shoe on the ground, and when Antonio bent to pick it up he reacted to a twinge in his back – we older folk knew just how he felt, but we all laughed. Benedick was very stern with both the prince and Claudio, and refused to be drawn into their banter, while Borachio’s confession shocked the pair of them deeply. They cut Claudio’s lines “Rightly reasoned, and in his own division….”, and I noticed this time that Antonio nodded his head slightly when Leonato mentioned his ‘niece’. They also cut Margaret and Benedick’s lines “who I think has legs.” “And therefore will come” which I remember hearing last time. No wonder half an hour has vanished.

To set up the temple scene, the two side blocks of the building slid back and were pushed off to either side; hence the disappearance of the musicians. They stayed in the same place, but the place itself moved back stage. I spotted Hero on the stairs this time, and when it came to finding Beatrice, Benedick was absolutely frantic, running here and there, finally asking which she was. Beatrice then tried to run off, but was prevented by a crowd of people and returned to face it out. The line “Peace! I will stop your mouths” was given back to Leonato, from whom a succession of editors had stolen it, and the shock of this forced kiss startled the pair at first. Then, with most of the others off stage, they decided to have another go, and spent quite some time in a passionate snog. After the messenger had brought the news of Don John’s capture, and Benedick had promised to sort him out tomorrow, the play ended with the servant girl finally handing Benedick the book he’d asked for several acts ago. It was funny, and a good way to end the drama part of the evening, but of course there was the dance to enjoy before we left. And enjoy it we did.

Some final points: I saw that Hero embraced her father before heading off for her marriage, so all was well there too, and in one of the later scenes Claudio referred to Benedick as “Bendy-dick” – Steve reckoned he heard this variation earlier as well. I did have a few sniffles this evening – emotions rather than a cold – but there was definitely more laughter than tears which is as it should be.

© 2012 Sheila Evans at ilovetheatre.me

Troilus And Cressida – August 2102

5/10

By William Shakespeare

Directed by Elizabeth LeCompte for The Wooster Group

Directed by Mark Ravenhill for the RSC

Venue: The Swan Theatre, Stratford

Date: Thursday 16th August 2012

This was always going to be a bizarre experience; fortunately, it was also an interesting one. Prompted by Rupert Goold, the RSC and the Wooster Group, an experimental theatre group based in New York, started looking at a co-production of a Shakespeare play, possibly Coriolanus. The Wooster Group took the idea on board and began to work on Troilus And Cressida, and when the RSC commitment became uncertain, they planned to go ahead themselves anyway (a lot of this info came from the post-show). When Rupert couldn’t squeeze every possible project into his tight schedule, the co-production looked finished, but then Mark Ravenhill came to the rescue. Well, all he was doing at the time was sitting in a cottage in Stratford writing a play for the RSC, so of course he had time to spare! (I jest, of course.) Still, out of this strange Frankenstein-like experiment of two groups of actors rehearsing the same play separately has come a weird progeny: like the creature in that story, it has both innocence and darkness, ugliness and beauty in about equal measure. Let’s give it a chance to breathe before we decide whether to kill it or let it live.

The two tribe concept was immediately apparent from the set. A wall of steel panels spanned the back of the stage with a tepee in front of it, surrounded by various objects such as metal drums, old tyres, etc. These were generally painted with bright colours, so it took me a while to realise what they were. This side of the wall represented the Native American location (Troy) and there was often a cooking fire, complete with suspended cooking pot, in the centre of the stage for these scenes. Electronic wizardry was also noticeable on either side at the back, poles with video screens in each corner and extra screens at the back of the stage and at the front of the circle.

When the wall turned round to the other side we were in the Greek camp, where they used a hospital trolley and screens to represent Achilles’ tent, and when the wall was end on to us or at an oblique angle it marked the scenes where both sides met in between, usually the battle scenes. The Native American costumes were a mix of modern and historical (I would guess) and their warriors wore bodies on their backs when fighting. It was as if they’d skinned more than a scalp off the enemies they killed and were using these trophies to show off their prowess in battle. I noticed when Pandarus was introducing the Trojan warriors to Cressida, one of them was a bit weaker looking and had no body on his back, presumably a beginner. The Greek soldiers wore British army fatigues, except when Achilles dressed up in a bright red evening dress, slit to the hip and with a low-slung back – very fetching. Thersites mostly knelt in a wheelchair, suggesting his lower legs had been cut off, and was usually in drag with wig, makeup and Spandex top.

The prologue was ditched altogether, and the play started with Troilus complaining to Pandarus that he’s still waiting to get Cressida’s love, whiny little brat that he is. Mind you, I wouldn’t have known that from the dialogue, as I wasn’t able to tune in to the accents being used for quite some time, and the actors’ delivery was rather monotonous which didn’t help. The American actors were also miked up, so the volume was fine, but they lacked clarity, which wasn’t. The talk between Troilus and Aeneas was likewise hard to follow, and I was beginning to regret coming. I did find some aspects of this staging funny though, especially the ludicrous wigs these non-Native Americans were wearing, and I was keen to see how the two halves would merge, so I stayed put.

Cressida’s arrival improved things slightly. Her initial exchange with Pandarus, spoken more quietly at the front of the stage, started to engage me even though I still wasn’t hearing the full dialogue. To view the returning warriors, she clambered on top of the tepee, with Pandarus standing just beside her. The warriors each came on stage, stood in a large circle at the centre and did a little dance before leaving. After Pandarus left, Cressida gave us her soliloquy quite well at the front of the stage before departing.

Now for the Greeks. Their arrival was pretty rumbustious; they were singing loudly to some heavy rock drumming, and the energy of the performance went up several notches. The dialogue became instantly clearer, and with no microphones we could easily identify the location of each speaker, which was proving much harder with the miked actors. This scene is very wordy, but with Scott Handy playing Ulysses we were in safe hands. He expressed Ulysses’ arguments so well that each phase of his reasoning followed on from the last, and all were necessary – no mean feat. Achilles had been lying on the trolley after their group entrance, but when Ulysses described Achilles’ slothful behaviour, the trolley came forward and Achilles even spoke some of the lines which Ulysses was reporting. I noticed Ulysses had a notebook which he checked to get Achilles’ exact words, which also suggested he had spies everywhere. Patroclus also acted out the impersonations which Achilles asked him to do, so we could clearly see what was going on.

After Aeneas’s arrival and the issuing of the challenge from Hector, all but Ulysses left the stage, with Nestor last of the group. He was called back by Ulysses, who described his plan for getting Achilles to cooperate with the other Greek leaders. His description of Ajax was scathing, but not inaccurate as we learned a few moments later when Ajax turned up and began to knock lumps out of Thersites. Ajax was played by Aidan Kelly, wearing a muscle suit which had ‘Ajax’ tattooed on the right breast in Greek letters, a Nike swoosh on the left breast (cheeky) and ‘I’M AWESOME’ plastered across his back in large letters. That was funny in itself, but his arrogant and stupid behaviour had us laughing often. He left off hitting Thersites after Achilles and Patroclus arrived, but he had already dragged Thersites from his wheelchair and left him on the ground. Achilles put him back in his chair, and then Thersites insulted everyone and left. Not a nice man. Ajax finally found out about the proclamation – that the Greeks would select their champion to meet Hector by lot – and that was the Greeks finished with for a while.

Back in Troy the king and his lords were discussing whether to send Helen back or not. Hector was all for it, Troilus argued against. I heard more of this debate than most of the previous Trojan dialogue, so that helped. Cassandra’s dire prophecy came over on the screens and loudspeakers rather than in person, although I did spot a woman peering out of the tepee towards the end of that speech; it may have been her, or maybe not. I suspect some dialogue was cut, as I don’t remember it taking too long to get through this scene, and then we were back with the Greeks.

Thersites’ explanation as to why he, Achilles, Patroclus and Agamemnon were all fools came across very clearly, and although I wasn’t sure at first about Zubin Varla’s portrayal, I quickly came to like his Thersites very much. The dialogue was clear, it commented on and explained the action very well, and his characterisation of Thersites as a Mancunian drag queen didn’t jar with this production. He often used a hand held microphone to deliver his lines, which worked very well in this version of the play. (And I learned from Zubin Varla after the post-show that he saw Thersites’ comments on the action as effectively being stand-up.)

When Agamemnon arrived, Achilles withdrew to his tent; the screen was partially drawn across but we could still see what was going on from our angle. Thersites stayed with Achilles, but Patroclus acted as door keeper and repelled all would-be boarders. Ulysses was pushed into the tent, and had a bedpan emptied over his head while he was there. Meanwhile Ajax was becoming even more vain and boastful, and the other Greek generals puffed him up as well, showing by their expressions to us what they really thought of him. When Agamemnon suggested that Ajax visit Achilles, Ulysses, while still drying himself off, cleverly prevented this by suggesting that Ajax was too important to run errands to Achilles, puffing him up even more.

In Troy, Pandarus had his witty exchange with a servant, and this time the humour came across much better. Scott Handy was doubling Ulysses and Helen in this production – given his lovely falsetto voice that was no surprise – and I liked the way this brought out the forced change of culture that both Helen and Cressida undergo. This Helen certainly looked like a fish out of water. Her clothes were a mixture of Greek and Trojan, she seemed disoriented and not at all happy to be amongst these people, but when the dancing started up she did join in a bit as if this was one of the few things she had found to enjoy in her new home. It was a sad performance (in a good way) and easily overshadowed the mushy presentation of this scene by the other actors. I only heard Helen say a few lines so the scene must have been severely cut, but apart from Scott’s performance it could have been dropped entirely for all the benefit I got from it.

The next scene showed us the first coming together of the eponymous lovers, and it worked reasonably well. With Pandarus sitting on his stool at the back making salacious comments, Troilus and Cressida spent most of the scene avoiding each other until the final moments of contact. We learned a few things about the Wooster Group’s techniques during the post-show, and this scene was a good example of how these manifested in performance. The actors spent a lot of time watching the screens to see the images, which were usually either from films that have influenced their creative thinking for the production or video filmed as part of their research into Northern Mid-West Native American tribes. On top of this they all had ear pieces as well as mikes, and during their scenes they had spirit voices which would talk in their ears, giving them messages to incorporate or ignore, or occasionally falling silent. That they managed to give any sort of coherent performance with all this going on is commendable, but how did it affect the audience perception?

For most of the scene Troilus and Cressida avoided physical contact. They sat on the stage together, stood and looked at the screens, did little dances or ran round in a circle. Their dialogue was connected, but they weren’t. When the moment of physical contact came with a touching of outstretched hands, the technology enhanced the moment with flashes from the screens and a loud noise to suggest an explosion or electrical discharge. The two lovers collapsed backward when this happened, an apt metaphor, but recovered to finish the scene with the prophetic vows.

I found this disconnection between the lovers less engaging, and it didn’t add anything to my understanding of the play. Pandarus was more engaged with both of them and as a result he came across much better as a character as well as his dialogue being more intelligible. The images being shown on the screens also didn’t add anything for me; there was usually so much happening on the stage that I rarely looked at them, although with this scene being a bit slower I did spot that there were stills from various movies being shown, images of lovers kissing for example. We didn’t know about the spirit voices at this time but I was certainly aware that the characters didn’t seem fully present, which was a bit insulting in a way as we were fully present, and had paid good money for the privilege! Despite this, I was again impressed by the way that Shakespeare’s text, given the tiniest opportunity, will reach out and hook the listener, keeping them interested and involved. So when they took the interval after this scene, the usual place, I was happy to stay for the second half to see how the experiment ended.

No so everyone. There were large gaps amongst us when the second half started with the Greeks hearing Calchas’s plea to exchange Antenor for Cressida, his daughter. As Danny Webb was doubling Agamemnon and Diomedes, he indicated the change of character by throwing a different hat onto the ground; when he picked it up and put it on, he was Diomedes, and spoke with an Australian accent to help us distinguish between them. He made good comic use of this technique, especially when Diomedes and Agamemnon were in the same scene, swapping hats briskly to change character.

For the tricking of Achilles, the Greek lords started over on the left side of the stage, with Ulysses lurking on the left walkway until the appropriate time. Achilles and Patroclus were centre stage, and I think Patroclus was wearing high heels by now – I don’t remember seeing them before this. The lords walked past the pair with attitudes of disdain, upsetting Achilles very much. After Achilles had registered his concern at being ignored, Ulysses made his entrance reading a book and again his subtle use of argument pushed Achilles in the very direction Ulysses wanted him to go. Mind you, it’s a dangerous thing to get Achilles worked up emotionally; he grabbed Ulysses at one point towards the end of their encounter and threw him across the stage; he had to be restrained by Patroclus. Ulysses managed to escape unharmed, however, and Patroclus was finally able to give Achilles much the same warning about his reputation, information which Achilles had been unwilling to listen to before. With Thersites’ arrival, we learned of Ajax’s preposterous behaviour which Thersites imitated for their benefit. He pulled his blond wig over his face and made nonsense answers to Patroclus and although I didn’t catch all of it, the lampooning was good fun.

In the next scene Diomedes arrived in Troy to take Cressida back to the Greek camp. Diomedes’ evaluation of Paris, Menelaus and Helen was clear, and then we returned to Troilus and Cressida after their night together.  Troilus came out of the tepee first, carrying his boots and clothes, and as I recall it was a little while before Cressida joined him – I don’t remember what he did in the meantime. She was wrapped in a blanket when she did appear, and with bare feet. They were closer physically this time. Aeneas warned Troilus that Cressida was about to be taken away, then Cressida herself heard the bad news from Pandarus and she and Troilus said their farewells and exchanged tokens. She wore a long yellow glove while he had some cloth on his arm, and holding hands they transferred first the cloth and then the glove across from one to the other. It was a nice touch, but otherwise I found the scene a bit dreary. The singsong intonation they were using had outstayed its welcome and I was feeling less charitable towards these Trojan-only scenes as a result.

Cressida was handed over to Diomedes, and this time I think Diomedes was directly involved in the conversation. When Cressida was brought back to the Greek camp, however, the Greeks clustered round the trolley, which was now in the centre of the stage with a dress placed on it, and ignored Cressida’s physical location. They addressed themselves to a Cressida of the imagination who was sitting on the trolley, and kissed thin air. Meanwhile Cressida took off her blanket and other garments before putting on the dress provided; after this, she became visible to the Greeks and started interacting with them directly. It was a strange way to do it, but it did show her assimilation into the Greek camp, and may have been an easier staging given the separate rehearsals. I didn’t feel I understood the attitudes of the Greek generals as well as I have done with more straightforward stagings, though, and Cressida was still a blank.

The meeting between the Greeks and Trojans was enlivened by Achilles’ appearance in his red party dress and lots more railing from Thersites. The scene between Diomedes and Cressida, overheard by Troilus and Ulysses, wasn’t helped by Cressida’s relatively deadpan delivery; again the Greeks were making much more of their lines and the emotional undercurrents of this play. I did feel that Troilus’s grief and anger at her betrayal was justified this time; sometimes he comes across as a whining brat, or I find myself wondering if he would actually have been as true as he’d sworn to be if they’d stayed together, but tonight his reaction seemed appropriate.

Andromache’s attempt to dissuade Hector from fighting was on the dull side, and then we were into the final battles. Achilles struck the first blow against the unarmed Hector, and instructed his Myrmidons to finish him off; they wore white coveralls with masks, like fencing masks. Diomedes and a Trojan – no idea who, sorry – had a fight at one point. Diomedes carried a cricket bat and the Trojan had a lacrosse stick, which was an entertaining way of representing the two cultures having the battle. (The cricket bat was always going to win, of course.) When Thersites was saying his last lines (the “bastard” speech) he stepped out of the wheelchair and stood behind it, taking off his clothes. At the same time, the wall swung round and one of the Trojans was standing on a ladder behind the tepee, also stark naked, apart from the black wig. When Thersites finished, he ran off with the wheelchair, and the wall had swung round again so the Trojan was out of view. No, I don’t have a clue either.

The final lines from Troilus and Pandarus didn’t make much of an impression on me, but I’d enjoyed enough of the performance that I didn’t feel I’d wasted the evening. The post-show was interesting, and we learned more about the Wooster Group’s processes, some of which I’ve included above. Their choice of a Native American setting for the Trojans was partly to enhance the idea of a different culture; they wanted to get away from a generically bland choice that wouldn’t contrast so well with the British half of the production. The singsong style of speech had helped them access the meaning of the dialogue (didn’t do the same for me, sadly) and although they’re not trained vocally to project in such a large space – hence the mikes – they did have a day’s training from an American expert in Shakespearean dialogue, and were rigorous in applying his lessons by obeying line endings, etc.

The videos we could see were not usually visible to the audience, so a thrust stage was obviously a new experience for them. Given this new situation, they were exploring possible changes, such as showing film of the actual cast on screen. The British scenes didn’t have pictures, of course, but they did show the oscilloscope display at times. They had five weeks to rehearse together, and I felt the British cast were supportive of their American colleagues. I commented on the humour I’d found in their performance, and Mark Ravenhill observed that Troilus And Cressida had originally been published as a ‘comedy’! (Though whether that was just to boost sales….) The production is still developing and changing all the time as they learn what works and what doesn’t. There were a number of appreciative comments which were well deserved, and although I wouldn’t endorse this style of experimental theatre, I did leave with respect for the American actors and their efforts. I wasn’t so impressed with their director, who seemed to have that arrogant attitude which implies that if the audience doesn’t get on with the performance it’s their fault, not the director’s. I may have picked that up wrong, but that’s how I saw it.

For me, the biggest drawback with their experimental style is that is goes against the raison d’être of theatre, which is to engage with the audience (and preferably with the other actors). Most of the technologically ‘innovative’ productions I’ve experienced tend to have this problem; the actors are so involved with the technology that they don’t actually relate to the audience at all, or not as much as they could. Technology is great in many ways, and has been used very successfully in a supplemental role, but it can’t drive productions as much as some people seem to think.

Another drawback was the choice of a Native American or Inuit setting for Troy. This led to the singsong delivery (already commented on) and a strange clash between the attention to detail, such as the occasional chanting and documentary-style videos, and the ludicrous costumes they wore which made them look like children dressing-up. I found a lot of humour in this approach, but I suspect it wasn’t intentional. For example, I made a connection between the Wooster Group name (from Wooster Street, apparently) and Bertie Wooster, seeing their style of production as the sort of ‘avant-garde’ rubbish Bertie would latch onto and which Jeeves would frown upon, only to be proved right in the end. It’s not a flattering comparison, but it did spring easily into my mind.

Additionally, my respect for the Native American culture, born out of ignorance I readily admit, meant that I found Pandarus’s speech at the end didn’t really work. He’d been a busybody, true, and eager to get Cressida into bed with Troilus, but he didn’t seem as lecherous as his final speech indicates. The Trojans came across as noble and decent, unlike the war-like Greeks (again, probably just my cultural conditioning).

The disparate styles didn’t bother me so much as the inappropriateness of the Americans’ style for this acting space, and I would happily see this experiment repeated, either with more compatible styles or perhaps using another language for one of the cultures – what chance German ‘Greeks’ attacking British ‘Troy’? The stand out performance had to be Scott Handy’s Ulysses/Helen, and it was worth the other stuff to have seen that alone, though the other Brits did splendid work as well.

© 2012 Sheila Evans at ilovetheatre.me

A Midsummer Night’s Dream (As You Like It ) – August 2012

2/10

By Dmitry Krymov, loosely based on some elements of Shakespeare’s play

Directed by Dmitry Krymov

Company: Chekov International Theatre Festival/Dmitry Krymov’s Laboratory/School of Dramatic Art Theatre

Venue: RST

Date: Wednesday 15th August 2012

For lovers of this director’s work, this was a joy, but it certainly won’t persuade me to sample the rest of his repertoire. The performers were all brilliant at what they do, and there were some fun moments during the hour and forty minutes it took to get through (plus a cute little dog running around on stage), but the rest just dragged, and I was surprisingly unmoved by the deaths of the two lovers at the end. For once, I didn’t even have the heart to pretend to applaud, apart from the ballet dancers. Fortunately the regular fans more than made up for my lack of enthusiasm, and gave them a standing ovation.

Despite the title, this was not A Midsummer Night’s Dream; the director found he could only relate to the mechanicals in this play, so all we got was their presentation of Pyramus and Thisbe. Nothing else – no Duke, no lovers, no fairies. Before the start, the stage had wooden flooring covered with a large plastic sheet. The backs of the chairs near the stage had cloth covers too, and Steve soon realised that water was likely to be involved.

We sat by the right hand walkway, only this time it had been removed and stairs put in (similar on the other side). Along the length of these stairs lay a huge tree trunk, with the base resting on one of the steps up to the stage. Several of the mechanicals were guarding it and chatting to members of the audience as well. Above the central aisle hung a huge chandelier, swathed in white cloth and hanging quite low. At the back of the thrust on both sides were two makeshift boxes, and I assumed these would be for the onstage audience. They had assorted chairs, and were marked off with planks of wood resting on piles of bricks or whatever else was around. The areas of the circle above them were also sectioned off, and I could see colourful throws spread on the backs of the seats. At the very back was a sheet, but it didn’t come into use till later, and apart from that I think the stage was bare.

With the house lights still up – they were regularly on for the audience participation sections – the action began. The mechanicals started talking loudly amongst themselves, and lifting up the tree trunk they carried it onto the stage. Others came along with branches, and because the items were so big, they filled the stage and even brushed the audience as the mechanicals swung them around trying to sort them out. There was also a small dog, a terrier, which ran down the tree trunk and around the stage, getting to know the audience.

The tree and its branches disappeared off the back, and then a fountain was brought on down the same aisle, with water pouring out of it intermittently on either side. We didn’t get splashed much in the end, and the performers were quick to get the buckets under the flow (and towels were handed out immediately afterwards). The fountain was also taken off at the back, and neither tree nor fountain was seen again, although the sheet at the back had some smudgy markings that may have been intended to represent leaves. The dog stayed behind, and positioned itself centre back, while a screen came down on which was projected a long-winded description of the mechanicals argument. Apparently they had been discussing Shakespearean verse styles, and there appeared to be lots of in-jokes about the director’s wife; the fans were laughing, but apart from some lines I didn’t find it particularly funny. The dog sat up a few times during this, and again the fans thought this was hilarious. I noticed the dog had something attached to its collar – possibly to give it instructions remotely?

I’m not sure of the exact order of events – always a problem with non-textual business – but fairly soon the mechanicals came on stage half-dressed and proceeded to put on their evening clothes. They were in a tight group in the centre of the stage, and when they were done they formed up in rows and waited. At one point a woman tried to push her way to the front, but couldn’t get through. Then the on-stage audience arrived. There were lots of them, including two young girls, and they took a long, long time to get on stage, look around, and then take their seats. There was some fun as a stroppy older woman character, who was carrying a bunch of flowers, used it to brush wood shavings off the plank at the front of their box; this was when I realised there were wood shavings on all their chairs, indicating the rough and ready nature of the mechanicals’ performance. The way that woman cleared the chairs was good fun, even if it went on far too long. Then there was the inevitable wrecking of the boxes themselves, with people falling into the stalls and planks of wood landing on the stage. It was all very predictable and took many minutes to sort out, and it was probably at this point that I first considered leaving before I wasted too much of my precious time.

After they were seated, the on-stage audience were all given champagne to drink (yawn), and then there were several minutes of ringing phones to sort out. Later in the performance, one chap took a call on his mobile and we saw the dialogue come up on the surtitles. He told someone he was in Stratford (funny) and was paying a fortune for international roaming! (even funnier) He had several goes at switching his phone off before the ‘action’ continued.

Back at the start, the on-stage audience were seated, refreshed, and phone-free, so they waited for the performance to begin, as did we. And we waited. And we waited. I found myself thinking that Communism had given the Russian people great patience – all that queuing for bread, perhaps. Then the performer front right whispered something to the chap next to him, and it was passed back, one to another. When the surtitles started up, we learned that the chap who plays the lion was being told not to pare his nails (he didn’t, he informed us).

One of the performers came to the front and turned to face the group on the stage. He delivered an approximation of Peter Quince’s wonderful prologue, conveying the sense of awkwardness and confusion beautifully. He wanted the audience on stage to know that their performance wasn’t ready yet, but as they hadn’t seen it before they wouldn’t know that. They weren’t intending to give the audience any enjoyment, though if they did enjoy it that was fine. They just wanted to give a good performance. They pushed some of these surtitles through so fast that I could only just catch the sense of the last one; something about enjoying the fact that we realised the performance wasn’t ready. Whatever the punch line, the rest of the speech was funny, and for once the time they took was worth it. I even started to enjoy myself. But it wasn’t to last.

After the speech and whispering (they may have happened the other way round) one of the actors fell flat on his face, passing out from all that waiting. The others picked him up, and he ran back as if to go off stage to deal with his bloody nose, but then he stopped and came back to the front to explain what they were doing. They had obtained a copy of a very ancient text from a friend who was working for the RSC, or possibly from the KGB vaults, and had learned that Pyramus and Thisbe were real people and that theirs was the first true love story. Forget Adam and Eve – who else could they fall in love with? – this was the real thing, and all other lovers’ stories sprang from them. The list was long, and there were several laughs along the way. But each love story has a THING, the THING that caused Eve to eat the apple, etc. The THING in Pyramus and Thisbe’s case was a LION. They had decided to strip the Pyramus and Thisbe story down to the essentials and were going to present that to us.

I think the group broke up after this bit, and then two large black bags were carried onto the stage and placed on either side. The one on the left turned out to be Pyramus’s puppet, while Thisbe’s was on the right. They spent a lot of time setting up Pyramus; the puppet was at least ten feet tall, with the performers just able to walk under his legs. He had two large hands, one of which could actually grasp things, and the face stuck to his head looked like an icon’s face, a young one at that, and quite good looking. They played with the idea that the puppet was difficult to control, having it fall over a couple of times by the boxes, and then brought it over to the front of the stage where it teetered on the brink for a few moments. As it was just by us, I spotted the puppet’s reaction to not falling on top of the audience – he wiped his hand across his brow and then flicked it to one side. I found it amusing, but I suspect the gloomy lighting hid it from the fans in the audience as there was no response from them. Mind you, there was plenty going on with all the mechanicals rushing around, the dog scampering here and there, and occasional interruptions from the on-stage audience, particularly the outspoken older lady who’d been cleaning the seats with her flowers. When they did interrupt, the performers stopped what they were doing and waited patiently for them to finish.

Once they had Pyramus up and walking, he went over to the circle on the left side and held out his hand to the people there. The woman who was with the children up there was frightened, and swatted at his hand with her bunch of flowers to make him go away. The older girl realised what was wanted, took the flowers and gave the bunch to the puppet, who grasped them in his hand. Then the stroppy one on the other side took a rose out of her bouquet and demanded that Pyramus pick that up as well. This was when the balancing acts came to the fore. The Shustov brothers, highly regarded acrobats in Russia (and I wouldn’t disagree with that assessment) did a couple of routines to hand Pyramus extra flowers to put in his bouquet. To give him the rose, they first had to get one of them on the other’s shoulders, and this took a few goes, as the upper one kept falling over the lower one and landing on the stage. Once they were balanced, someone handed the top guy the rose (flicked up from another acrobat’s foot?) and he held it out as Pyramus came over and took it in his right hand, then moved it over and slotted it into the bouquet he was holding in his left hand. It was impressive work for a puppet. To cap all this, the brothers then went into reverse, as it were, and handed Pyramus another colourful bunch of flowers with one balanced on the other’s head, and the flowers held in his outstretched foot. It was impressive, I’m sure, but as my view was blocked almost entirely for this bit I had to guess at what was going on from the audience’s reactions. They did take a break during this section – don’t remember if it was another audience interruption or not – and I could see the top brother walk his way down the wall and rest there, at right angles to the lower brother, while whatever else was going on was completed. Pyramus added these flowers to the bouquet with equal dexterity, and to much applause.

There was another balancing act as well, but neither of us can remember what was given to Pyramus by this means. This time it was Boris Opletaev (as far as I can tell from the pictures in the program) who stacked several cylinders, with short wide ones being placed rim down and longer narrow ones placed across them on their side and oriented in different directions. When he placed a board on top of these, we could see that the stack rolled every which way, and yet he stepped up onto it, steadying himself with a hand on a nearby shoulder, and stood there, rocking relatively gently, to do whatever this bit required. It was an impressive performance – they all were – and a momentary relief from the monotony.

With Pyramus good to go, we only needed Thisbe, so her bag was unpacked too. The woman who had been hanging around at the start turned out to be Thisbe’s voice; she and one of the men sang beautifully to convey the characters’ feelings, sometimes just ‘ah’ sounds, sometimes songs in German. Thisbe herself was as tall as Pyramus, and made out of odds and ends as he was. She had a white skirt, two breasts, and a doll’s head, large size, and her mouth worked when she was talking. We didn’t get any surtitles for the songs, but her “Nein” in response to Pyramus’s declaration of love was pretty straightforward. She said ‘no’ a few times, and Pyramus had to flaunt his shapely leg before she would sit down with him and chat.

Once seated towards the back of the stage, the wooing could proceed in earnest. First the food. Pyramus obviously likes his women well fed, so he gave her a peach, then a pair of cherries, then a pineapple, still with its spiky top. It was impressive enough the way he held out his hand, grasped the fruit which was put into it, then transferred it round to Thisbe’s mouth. She was a girl with a good appetite, too; her head had been changed during the move to the back of the stage, and now she had a head which flipped back at mouth level so she could swallow large fruits whole, which was very funny. She did stop Pyramus when it came to the pineapple though; instead, she took the fruit herself and put it in her own mouth, leaving a bit of the top sticking out, also funny.

For entertainment, the dog act came forward, and the lovely little chap (I’m talking about the dog) did some fun tricks, including a back flip. With the foreplay done, Pyramus needed some help to get ready for the next stage. Accompanied by many sound effects, his metal crotch panel was unscrewed and a large penis thrust through the gap. It was lying on the floor, and a pump had been brought on to get it upright, when the on-stage audience started to protest about the appropriateness of such things when there were children present. To be fair, it was mainly the old lady, but even so they had to interrupt the coitus, and a deflated Pyramus left the stage through the back curtain.

With Thisbe left alone, the lion made his appearance. Another black bag had been brought on and left near the front. Not as big as the others, it was still large enough to have a person inside it, so I wasn’t surprised when the lion leapt out. Don’t know who played him, but it was a lovely costume, with claws on the knees as well as the hands, a shaggy mane and a long tail. One chap held the tail and used it to drag the lion back when needed – I assume it would be too difficult to move backwards in that costume – and two other men attached bat wings to the lion’s back and held them open, flapping them to suggest a devil-lion. As they stood in front of me throughout this scene I had to rely on my knowledge of the story to guess what was happening. After each lunge of the lion towards Thisbe, I did see one chap come forward and place strips of white cloth and red ribbon around the centre of the stage, obviously representing the bloody cloth that Pyramus will find later. At some point, possibly before the lion left the stage, the stroppy old woman interrupted the action to tell a long-winded story about a lion that had destroyed a town, some of which was quite funny.

After several lunges at Thisbe, the lion left the stage. Thisbe was in a terrible state. She was so terrified that she peed in a basin for a very long time. Then she too left the stage, and they used a lovely piece of staging to create the moonshine. A rope of some reflective or glowing material was laid out in a wavy pattern on the stage further back from most of the bloody strips of cloth. Behind the sheet, a wobbly moon rose, and as it did so, the rope lit up, shining in the moonlight. It was a beautiful effect.

Pyramus returned to discover the bloody strips of cloth by this light, and he went to pieces at this point, literally. His arms came off and danced around towards the front of the stage, while his head came off and turned around towards the back. When it turned back again, his face had aged – a good trick – and as this happened twice he ended up with what looked like a bearded Christ face. He stabbed himself through the stomach and fell forward, dead or dying.

Thisbe returned accompanied by four swans carried by four of the performers. The swans had red beaks which looked suspiciously like dildos to me, and the rest of the swan was made of a sheet wrapped round and round for the neck and bundled together for the body. While the woman on stage had normally sung for Thisbe, I think it was the woman in the circle who now sang, and she had a lovely contralto voice, deep and rich. Thisbe saw Pyramus, and after a short lamentation she also fell on top of him, with the swans grouped round them, bobbing their heads. Pyramus raised his head briefly when Thisbe arrived, but it sank back down again quickly, and finally the show was over. Or was it? There was no way of telling with this production.

The on-stage audience were offered the option of an epilogue or a dance, and the old lady was very emphatic that they do the dance. Being Russian, this naturally meant ballet, and four dancers in tutus came to the front of the stage. As the music for the Dance of the Cygnets started up, they formed a line – with difficulty, as one of the four was preening herself in front of the audience too much – and did a set or two of the dance in step with each other. After that, things went from bad to worse, with heads going in different directions, bobbing up instead of down, and some cygnets forgetting which direction they were dancing in. It was a lovely interpretation of Shakespeare’s scene: with the Russian fondness for ballet this would instantly have illustrated the mechanicals’ ineptness, and it reminded me of the Nine Worthies scene at the end of Love’s Labour’s Lost.

The on-stage audience gradually left during this dance (lucky people), and when they’d finally gone the dancers stopped, very relieved and gasping for breath. Most of the cast were towards the back of the stage, with the dancers breathing heavily near the front, when the stroppy old lady came back to have a word with the man who was sweeping the stage. He’d been getting in the dancers’ way, wanting to sweep the bit of stage they were dancing on, but now he stopped and talked with the woman. She had recognised him – he’d played Shakespeare – and although the surtitles didn’t give us much of their conversation, I gathered that she was arranging to see him sometime soon. It was a little romance to end the evening with, after this tale of thwarted love. The music started up again, the dancers tried to carry on, but they were completely out of sync this time and the whole show ground to a halt.

The man with the bloody nose came to the front to tell us that although there was no need, he’d summed up the story for us. He handed a piece of paper to the main singer, who stood centre front and started scat singing – quite funny. The woman also came forward and tore off the bottom half of the paper, then joined in with a different set of scat noises. Others also joined in, some taking smaller and smaller bits of paper, until there was a cacophony of music. I don’t remember how they ended this bit, but eventually the cast disappeared off the back of the stage, though the bloody nose chap came back on to remove something which he’d used near the start to keep some raised flaps in place. As they fell back, he left the stage and the applause suggested we were finally at the end of the performance. The whole cast came back on to take their bows, the director presumably appearing as well although I couldn’t see him; some in the audience stood, there was lots of cheering, and I left after the first set of bows, glad to be getting out into the fresh air.

While this description of the staging may sound interesting, I’ve left out a lot of the boring bits, mainly because nothing happened during them. The Russian ability to pause is beyond belief, and the length of time they spent on some sections of the business left me cold. The physical business was usually telegraphed well in advance, and while I enjoyed some bits, and laughed quite a few times, there wasn’t enough of that for me. I like puppetry very much and I was becoming very fond of these two giant people, but the pauses for other business, including the woman’s lion story, drained any enthusiasm I’d developed for the performance, and I was very glad when it ended. I haven’t looked at my watch so often at the theatre for a very long time, and I hope I never feel the need to do so again. Brilliant as the performers clearly are, this just didn’t work for me, but thankfully most of tonight’s audience enjoyed it more than I did.

© 2012 Sheila Evans at ilovetheatre.me

Kiss Me Kate – August 2012

9/10

Music and lyrics by Cole Porter

Book by Sam and Bella Spewack

Directed by Trevor Nunn

CFT and Old Vic co-production

Venue: Chichester Festival Theatre

Date: Thursday 9th August 2012

As predicted, this was a much improved performance. The whole production was much clearer, and seeing it from a central position gave us a much better view. The scene changes were quicker and the dances covered the action better, and although there were one or two very minor fluffs early on tonight the whole show went very smoothly. Because of that, and possibly because of our improved position, I could spot the deliberate errors this time. There was a running gag that one of the dancers couldn’t get her steps right, and they had several extra practice runs to help her. She fell over and knocked into the other dancers, but eventually she cracked it! And of course there are deliberate mistakes during the onstage musical when Lilli/Kate throws her tantrums, and these showed up better tonight as well.

Kate’s I Hate Men was even better than before, and all the songs and dances had come on. Bill/Lucentio was fully up to speed, and First and Second Man were much better. The dialogue was much sharper, and I caught a lot of the lines and lyrics that I’d missed first time round. It wasn’t so clear to me that the General wasn’t right for Lilli tonight – don’t know what’s changed there – but I found Lilli’s leave-taking and Fred’s reprise of So In Love very moving. We were a noisy audience tonight (including some surprising coughs) and were treated to one encore for Always True To You In My Fashion and two for Brush Up Your Shakespeare. And we applauded mightily at the end as well, with more sniffles on my part. Great fun.

Post-show:

There was lots of humour, especially from the General (Mark Heenehan). Hannah declared they were a very happy company, then Gremio ratted on her ‘voice resetting’ noises backstage. She retaliated with the way he frequently changed his lines, and it wasn’t long before the General was remarking that her earlier comment about it being a very happy company…..  Clive Rowe kept disagreeing with everyone else, and with Adam Garcia apparently dancing despite a slipped disc (an earlier performance) you might be forgiven for thinking that life backstage resembled the story of the musical. Fortunately the humour shone through, and they clearly are enjoying themselves very much. Mind you, the backstage action with all the very quick costume changes is a whole show in itself.

On the transfer to the Old Vic, the cast are looking forward to it. Most of them are going, and will get another two weeks to rehearse the changes. The choreographer hasn’t seen the Old Vic stage yet, so doesn’t know how things will change on the proscenium arch stage. At least the Festival Theatre stage gives them plenty of room for the dances. The costumes needed some changes to accommodate the dancing; apparently there was no coordination between the designer and the choreographer beforehand. The slanted set has given the cast some problems as well. There’s a mark on the stage to tell them where the centre is, but it’s hard to see and this may explain some of the difficulty we had on our first viewing.

After the general had finished wowing us with the casual mention of his chat with Kevin Spacey the other day (get her!), he was able to say that this is the first production from Chichester to transfer to the Old Vic since the days when the Old Vic was the National Theatre. (Hopefully they’ll know it by then, he added.)

Trevor Nunn’s experience with Shakespeare came in very handy; he gave the cast a day workshop on delivering Shakespearean dialogue, and apparently changed the script in some way to make it closer to the original play. He also chose to have Taming – The Musical done in Elizabethan costume, which hadn’t been done before (I’m not sure if that’s true, but that’s what was said).

It’s hard for the cast when they have several days off while Heartbreak House is on; as we learned from the Singin’ In The Rain post-show, the muscles need regular use to keep the performance standard up. Didn’t manage to ask if they’ll be doing a cast recording – I do hope so.

© 2012 Sheila Evans at ilovetheatre.me

Much Ado About Nothing – July 2012

7/10

By William Shakespeare

Directed by Iqbal Khan

Venue: Courtyard

Date: Tuesday 31st July 2012

We’ve seen a number of Much Ados over the years; some have been splendid, some have failed to get off the ground, but tonight’s performance is undoubtedly in the former category. This was the final preview before press night, and from the pre-show director’s talk we learned that about twenty minutes had been cut from the previous performance (and at three and a half hours that was just as well!) so the cast were having to deal with lots of changes. That, the blocking and some clunky stagings were the reason for only rating this at 7/10; with practice the actors will speed up and from a different perspective we should see a lot more of the crucial scenes. It only remains for the director to tighten up a few scene changes and we’ll be well on our way to full marks.

In the pre-show talk, the director explained how he came to Michael Boyd’s attention, via Meera Syal. He also discussed the concept for the piece; at first he didn’t want ‘Asian’ and insisted on having a free choice to do the play in whatever way suited it. After some research, including a visit to Delhi, he felt modern India would fit the play better than setting it in the past – historical India has too many political resonances which would drown out the issues dealt with in the play. He treats the text with respect, not reverence, and considers that his job is to serve the audience, not the author. Over the years he has done a one and half hour Othello and a four hour Hamlet, so he clearly takes each production as it comes. He also likes to make use of what the actors bring – twenty heads are better than one. He was asked about caste issues; they did discuss these during rehearsals, but again the director felt that those concerns belong to another play. I did learn that darker skin means lower caste, which made Claudio’s comment about his second bride – “were she an Ethiop” – much more telling in this interpretation.

Now to the performance. Announcements both inside and outside the auditorium were made by Dogberry, and included ‘switch off your digital crotches’ and ‘do not abuse your mobile phones’. Photography was going to be acceptable for once, until another servant corrected him. The set was a wonderful paved courtyard space, with a building behind on two levels – three if you count the roof. A balcony had rooms to left and right of a central door, and a large tree in front of it to the right, with lots of branches and a seat underneath. There was a swing hanging on this tree from a branch to the right of it; normally hung up against the tree, the swing was brought down several times.

It was lovely to see that the balcony of Leonato’s house blended with the Courtyard balcony. There were stairs up to balcony on the left hand side of the house, and steps up to the stage at the front – we noticed the grille during the pre-show and realised there would be water. Both voms had been removed, but there were steps up to the stage at each side.

Before the start, the washing was hung up over the stage, and Leonato’s household were getting the sheets down. Verges (Ursula in most productions) was bossing everyone about, while Dogberry was joining in and getting so stroppy with the people up above that he banged his foot against a seat. I laughed at this, and got some choice remarks sent in my direction (nothing I couldn’t handle) about his bunion hurting. Other members of the household staff arrived, and we could also see Beatrice sitting up on the balcony with what looked like a folder or book; it turned out to be an iPad, which she brought down to show to the audience. Apparently her nephew had been setting her up with potential suitors, but she wasn’t impressed and showed us the picture of an elderly man sitting in his library, making some disparaging comments about his suitability. This section felt like we were part of the community of this house, neighbours who just happened to be sitting around, and certainly got me involved from the start. The band were back right for most of the play, under the balcony, then moved somewhere else and did a lap of honour at the end.

Hero and Margaret returned from a shopping trip, well laden, and showed off some of their purchases to Beatrice, who had returned to the balcony. Leonato arrived at the front of the stage, bearing the message about the prince, and at some point Verges sent everyone scurrying to prepare for visitors. They brought out a floral garland and a tray with the powder on it, which Beatrice held for her uncle when the prince arrived. Before that, the chat between her and the soldier was fun and he eventually conceded defeat with good grace.

Don Pedro arrived with his brother, Claudio and Benedick. For this scene, it was Don John blocking our view, but not too badly. Leonato greeted Don Pedro with the garland and put the spot on his forehead (tilak?), and then Beatrice and Benedick were into their battle of wits. When Leonato welcomed Don John, he was indeed “not of many words”, which got a laugh. When Claudio was talking with Don Pedro and Benedick about Hero, Dogberry and Borachio were clearing some things off the stage, and thus heard about Don Pedro’s plan to woo Hero on Claudio’s behalf. Claudio blocked my view of Benedick asking the prince to “constrain me to tell”, but from the delivery I could tell it was entertaining.

After these three left, we could see Dogberry whispering his version of the story to Antonio. Leonato called out to his brother from the balcony, and Antonio reported what he’d heard, while Dogberry slunk away before he could be called on to confirm the details. The next scene had Conrad and Don John on stage. A servant brought them bottles of beer, and while they were drinking and talking, Borachio came along with his news. Don John came across as someone who simply liked to be contrary, and given the downturn in his fortunes he was determined to cause as much trouble as he could. Borachio was another drinker – he was hardly ever without a drink in his hand before his arrest.

The party scene took a little while to set up, with Leonato and Antonio putting on scarves and some make up, while the women wore the men’s military jackets over their dresses and acted the male parts. There was a lively dance, with the Prince’s men also wearing scarves, and occasionally the rest of the dancers moved to the back of the stage so that a conversation could take place at the front. This included Margaret’s chat with Balthazar and Verges’ (Ursula’s) chat with Antonio. Her references to head-wagging were very appropriate.

After Beatrice and Benedick’s conversation most of the dancers left the stage, so only Claudio, moping on the tree seat, Don John and one of his followers were left. They stirred up Claudio, pretending to think he was Benedick, so Claudio stormed off when Benedick arrived to take him to the Prince, and Benedick also left when Beatrice arrived. I noticed it was Beatrice who found and brought Claudio to the Prince; clearly a competent woman.

Claudio’s halting protestations of love to Hero (once Don Pedro gave him the good news) were not highly thought of by the others, hence Beatrice’s plea to Hero to “let him not speak neither”. Don Pedro was upset at being refused by Beatrice, and I wasn’t sure how much his plan to have her and Benedick fall in love with each other was devised partly out of spite for that rejection.

Borachio and Conrad were drinking, or rather Conrad was too far gone to drink so one of the others took his bottle, for the scene where they planned Hero’s downfall, and Borachio helped Conrad off at the end. Don’t know why they went so far with the alcoholism. Then came the first gulling scene. One of the servants, a woman, was sitting on the swing. Benedick arrived, took off his shoes and sat on the bench, and asked her to go for his book. She demurred, so Benedick chased her off and then sat on the swing himself to deliver his next speech. It was rather rushed, and didn’t get the full humour out of his total refusal to wed followed by his detailed list of the attributes his bride would require – that may come with time.

When the three other men arrived, Benedick ran off the stage to begin with and then lurked round the far side next to the audience, while Leonato, Claudio and Don Pedro used the whole of the stage. Balthazar sang a funky Indian version of “Sigh no more”, which was very good, before leaving them to it. Leonato was having the usual difficulty in keeping up with the others, but managed to think of a funny story when prompted by the prince.

During this talk, the servant came back with the book, and was trying to give it to Benedick but couldn’t get his attention. After he took to the tree and then the balcony, she gave up and started listening to the story the others were telling. She even became part of the action after the “between the sheets” gag, falling to the ground and acting out Beatrice’s suffering as the story unfolded. Benedick was up on the roof at the end, and after he came down she was trying to give him the book still, but failed. Don Pedro and Claudio didn’t fancy leaving when Leonato said “My Lord, will you walk?” but fairly ran off the stage when he added “dinner is ready”.

This scene still needs work, I feel. The director made changes here before tonight’s performance, so that doesn’t help, but Benedick is so out of touch with the others when he’s up on the roof, and possibly out of sight of the audience as well, that it takes a lot of the fun out of the scene. The servant’s inclusion does add some humour, but at the expense of seeing Benedick being tricked into loving Beatrice, although I reckon he’s really being tricked into admitting his true feelings for her.

Beatrice came out with her mobile phone when she called Benedick to dinner. He was back on the swing at this point, with a stupid grin on his face. His attempts to make Beatrice’s surliness seem like indicators of love were funny. For Beatrice’s gulling, Hero gave Verges a phone and then went inside – we could see her behind the shutters of an upstairs room, where Margaret joined her after getting Beatrice involved. Verges and Hero conversed using the speakers on their mobiles. Meanwhile, Beatrice had been brought out onto the balcony, hair in a towel, bleaching cream on her top lip, and ended up on the tree seat just far enough round to appear hidden but without actually being out of sight.

I was aware that many of Hero and Verges’ comments were accurate; Beatrice does scorn all offers and turns “every man the wrong side out”. I found it harder to hear all the lines with this staging, but I got the gist. Verges moved over to the tree seat herself as the conversation progressed, and somewhere around “Yet tell her of it”, Beatrice slid round next to Verges who had to acknowledge her presence. Her lines after that were said with Beatrice right there, and when the ‘gulling’ was concluded and Beatrice was left alone, she took off the towel, wiped her lip, and resolved to requite Benedick’s love. She danced around a bit, waving the towel, then caught it in her arms and stood there, rocking it like a baby. After a few seconds she realised what she was doing and threw the towel down before heading off.

Benedick had been quick about getting shaved and putting on some hair dye. His hair had been grizzled at the start; now his black locks gleamed against his clean-shaven face. His military garb had been transformed into trousers and a long turquoise top, and if I hadn’t known who he was I might not have recognised him. He responded to the prince and Claudio’s barbs with spirit, and although his shaven face was revealed at the start of the scene, which is too soon for me, the overall effect was fine. Don John stirred up Claudio and the prince as usual, and then the watch arrived. They used the household servants for this, and made it out to be a special guard duty which they were doing on a one-off basis for the wedding. We were blocked again from seeing some of this scene, but the lines were OK. When Dogberry left the first time, the watch sat down on the steps, apart from one chap who squatted near us with a see-through umbrella over him.

The director mentioned that he’d cut two scenes together, and this was that spliced section. During the earlier scenes, the staff had set up a wedding platform underneath the tree. A mannequin stood to the left of this with the wedding dress on it, and for the first bit of this scene I could just make out Margaret and Hero on the platform, behind the chap with the umbrella. Then Dogberry came back briefly, and then I think they finished the scene on the platform with Beatrice’s arrival. After this, the women left, taking the wedding dress with them. Then it was the arrival of Borachio and Conrad, still drinking, to be arrested by the watch. The chap with the umbrella stood up to listen to the two men, and Borachio obviously took him for a tree, because he peed all over him. (This is becoming a little tedious now.) The others crept forward from the steps onto the stage, surrounded the villains and apprehended (or as Dogberry would say “comprehended”) them. Interval.

During the interval they finished setting up the stage for the wedding, and again Dogberry and Verges were bossing people about. Cloth streamers were handed out to the few members of the audience who had stayed in the auditorium with instructions to pass them back. Eventually they were all attached to wires and drawn up to form a canopy over the platform – a nice effect, but perhaps a little costly later on?

The second half started with Beatrice on the balcony singing “Sigh no more”, followed by Dogberry and Verges turning up to report their arrest of Conrad and Borachio. It seemed slightly strange that Leonato called Dogberry “good neighbour”, but it was even stranger that Dogberry and Verges were holding a pair of trousers each, presumably from the arrested men. They held the trousers up to show Leonato, but he was too focused on his daughter’s wedding, and sent them away. If only…

The wedding scene was very good, from what I could see of it. Dogberry and Verges got several audience members up on the stage and sitting on cushions. The families processed onto the stage from each side, and garlands were exchanged; Beatrice and Benedick also exchanged grimaces with theirs. Hero and Claudio sat side by side on the platform, and it all seemed to be going very well. The music was very lively, there was a lot of colour and smiling faces. What could possibly go wrong?

They were using the term ‘Pandit’ instead of “friar” for this scene, and they also used a microphone for the wedding ceremony, passing it from speaker to speaker. Claudio certainly used it when he accused Hero of not being a virgin, although it was put aside at some point. Hero stayed on the platform, collapsing there, while her father ranted near the front of the stage. I didn’t have the best view, because the stool in front of us was occupied during most of this bit, first by Antonio(?), then Benedick, then the Pandit (sigh). (As a result, though, I can grass up the Pandit; his comments about “noting of the lady” were spectacularly inaccurate tonight, as he spent very little time looking in her direction.)

Despite my restricted view, I was able to spot Margaret’s reaction to the story the prince and Claudio were telling. She clearly realised her part in all this, and left quickly. I hope to get a better idea of this scene another time, but it came across quite strongly all the same. The use of the microphone plus the upbeat start served to emphasise Hero’s public humiliation, and made Claudio and the prince’s acts all the more shocking.

After Hero was taken away, the scene between Benedick and Beatrice was very good; she was very strong, and he seemed to grow up a lot in this scene. I reckoned it was the emotional trauma that allowed them to come into some sort of relationship, especially the fact that Benedick supported her family and was on Hero’s side. Her line “Kill Claudio” raised a laugh, which I always find hard to understand. This is a serious request, and a sobering one, not some silly adolescent joke. Benedick’s response shows how reluctant he is to take such an extreme measure, thereby also emphasising his feelings for Beatrice when he eventually accepts the task.

After they left, the watch, their prisoners and the sexton arrived for the interrogation scene. Not only were Conrad and Borachio without their trousers, they were trussed together, back to back, so walking was difficult for them, They had to sit back to back on the stage while the sexton, who sat on the platform, took notes. The watch were much better at giving evidence than Dogberry and Verges, as usual, and the final insistence by Dogberry, that everyone “remember that I am an ass!”, was very funny.

Now the wedding platform and decorations had to be taken away, and this was done during Leonato and Antonio’s opening speeches in the next scene. The cloth streamers were lowered and unhooked, and finally dragged off through the doors, while the swags and other fancy bits were also removed. This took some time, and during it the two men had to be careful where they stood, as they could easily have disrupted the whole process by standing on a bit of cloth. There may also have been a reluctance to talk while the servants were around, but I think the main problem was the delaying effect of removing so much cloth from the stage. This slowed the start of this scene down so much that it almost stopped altogether, but once the stage was de-weddinged, the pace picked up with Leonato’s comment “My soul doth tell me Hero is belied”, and the rest of the scene, though slow, worked OK.

The verbal fisticuffs between the old men and the soldiers was a bit dull, possibly because of the earlier lack of pace, but once Benedick came on the energy lifted a bit. He handled the prince and Claudio’s mocking very well, staying focused on his primary intent, which was to challenge Claudio. The prince and Claudio reacted to the news that Don John had left, but without changing their attitude completely.

When Dogberry and the watch brought on the prisoners again, they were in an even worse state than before. Their shirts had gone, and they were still struggling to get on and off the stage tied together as they were. Borachio’s confession changed the situation, and Claudio knelt down and put his head to Leonato’s feet as he was apologising. Leonato handled things well, I thought, and for once Antonio didn’t react when Leonato suggested that Claudio should marry his niece, Antonio’s daughter “almost the copy of my child that’s dead”. Either he’s a bit slow on the uptake, hard of hearing, or the brothers had already planned this way of bringing Hero back to life (my preferred interpretation). I think Leonato gave Dogberry some paper money for his “pains”.

The next scene showed us Margaret, apparently recovered from her guilt over her part in Hero’s dishonouring, bantering with Benedick.  After she left we were treated to Benedick’s appalling lack of talent in the musical department, followed by his inability to rhyme, all of which was mercifully cut short when Beatrice turned up. They sat on the swing together while they discussed their attraction to each other.

To create the setting for the scene in the memorial, the central part of the building was opened up while the side doors were folded back, creating a space on either side. They chose to have rain at the back of the stage, behind the building, and it ran forward, hence the grilles in the steps at the front. Several of the cast were out in the rain, with umbrellas keeping them dry. For the reciting of the poem, Claudio was at the front along with the prince and a veiled woman, didn’t see who. Steve remembers Hero being on the steps to the left, wearing a veil. Balthazar sang the song, standing on the little bit of balcony that remained, and after the prince and Claudio left to prepare for the wedding, Leonato and his family emerged from their mourning garb to make their own arrangements. Hero wasn’t entirely happy with her father at this point, refusing to embrace him, and who can blame her? With the women off the stage, Benedick made his request for Beatrice’s hand in marriage, and then the prince and Claudio returned for the final scene.

Given the amount of rain, the staff had been very busy drying the floor during all of this. Otherwise the set remained the same, although I did spot the ends of two carpets or rugs sticking out at the very back of the stage, off to the left, presumably to do with the wedding ceremony. As well as changing “friar” to ‘Pandit’, references to “church” had become ‘temple’, which worked just fine for me.

After the initial discussion, and Claudio making his remark about an “Ethiop”, the women returned. The prince and Claudio were confronted by four women with veils over their heads which were also held out on front of them. For once, I had no idea who was who, and neither did Benedick when he tried to find Beatrice, although I could guess which one she had to be. The exchange of written love letters was very good, with Beatrice reacting strongly to the inadequacy of Benedick’s efforts, then changing her response so as not to hurt his feelings. The prince sat near the front as Benedick told him to get a wife, and the news about Don John’s arrest was also quickly dealt with by Benedick.

They finished with a lively dance, Indian style, which went on for some time. I clapped along, but the audience was pretty unresponsive until the dance stopped, and then we all applauded well enough for two rounds of bows, with the musicians taking their lap of honour after the first lot. And a marvellous job they’d done, too.

Overall, the only problem with this production was the slow pace, which I suspect was largely due to the many changes the cast had had to assimilate plus the cumbersome scene changes. The dialogue was mostly clear, though the use of Indian accents sometimes blurred the lines too much. Again, that should improve with practice, and I’m looking forward to seeing this one again.

© 2012 Sheila Evans at ilovetheatre.me