Jacobean tale of incest is a 21st century triumph
Theatre
‘TIS PITY SHE’S A WHORE
Barbican
****
by Steve Dinneen
JOHN Ford’s Jacobean tale of incest and revenge is dragged kicking and screaming into the 21st century in this highly stylised and deliciously sinister production.
The forbidden love between Giovanni and his sister Annabella is portrayed as a tender but doomed affair – similar in many ways to another famous pair of star-crossed Italian lovers. It was hugely controversial at the time and has lost little of its impact now.
Lydia Wilson, as the object of desire, strikes a perfect balance between youthful innocence and sexual awakening, with a display reminiscent of her take on Cate in Sarah Kane’s Blasted. Laurence Spellman, though, provides the stand-out performance as the ambiguous, sadistic Vasquez, delivering his lines with a hilarious Cockney flourish.
‘Tis Pity’s plot is, as you’d expect of a Jacobean tragedy, convoluted: condensing it to two hours inevitably means some parts – notably Giovanni and Annabella’s proposed husband Soranzo – feel a little under-developed. Director Declan Donnellan takes some brave liberties with the material; character’s insecurities manifest themselves on the compact stage and overlapping scenes swirl into one another, giving the whole sordid affair a nightmarish quality. It’s dark, gruesome and very gory – and all the better for it.
Theatre
A MIDSUMMER NIGHT’S DREAM
Hammersmith Lyric
****
by Steve Dinneen
IT HAS been a while since I was a student but I’m pretty sure A Midsummer Night’s Dream didn’t start with a stand-up routine. This Filter production, though, sets out its stall from the very start: it is not your average Shakespeare.
The action takes place in what looks like a subterranean bathroom, complete with grotty, tiled walls and decked out with a full band. Shakespeare’s characters are little more than a vague inspiration for Filter’s grotesque creations: Oberon is reimagined as a second-rate super-hero, complete with spandex costume and silver cape; Puck is a burly, tattooed roadie; Bottom is well… that would be telling. Suffice to say you’ll be pleasantly surprised.
An extra onion-layer is written into the play-within-a-play, adding to the overall atmosphere of confusion. The fourth wall isn’t so much broken as bulldozed and set alight; one improvised moment saw Puck challenge a member of the audience to throw a bread-roll at him. It’s a slapstick affair that owes as much to Laurel and Hardy as it does William Shakespeare: that the fine thread weaving the whole production together remains more or less intact is worthy of praise in itself.
Anyone with a particular attachment to the bard’s words will want to chew through their tongue before they get half way through this production. Everyone else should add it to their calendar.