ALEX HALL is disgusted by the misuse of ‘emotional narratives’ to justify uninformed geo-political prejudice
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Winter gloom
SIMON PARSONS questions whether a dark take on Shakespeare’s Seasonal comedy is in harmony with the original text
(L to R) Cat McKeever as Olivia's Attendant, Daniel Millar as Fabien, Michael Grady-Hall as Feste and Charlotte O’Leary as Olivia’s Woman
SUE TURNER welcomes a thoughtful, engaging book that lays bare the economic realities of global waste management
JOHN GREEN welcomes an insider account of the achievements and failures of the transition to democracy in Portugal
SIMON PARSONS applauds an imaginative and absorbing updating of Strindberg’s classic
PETER MASON is enthralled by an assembly of objects, ancient and modern, that have lain in the mud of London’s river
MICK McSHANE rubs shoulders with Mod legend Steve Craddock and joins in with the joyous Glasgow choir
DENNIS BROE sifts out the ideological bias of the newest TV series offerings, and picks out what to see, and what to avoid
Twelfth Night
Royal Shakespeare Theatre, Stratford Upon Avon
A BLEAK, funereal setting constantly being touched up with black paint and later dominated by an oversized organ is James Cotterill’s unsettling design for a play that usually champions life and passion.
Director Prasanna Puwanarajah’s dark take on Shakespeare’s bittersweet comedy leans heavily on the bitter, especially where the original text is concerned, and much of the humour is an addition in the form of Feste’s extended clowning routines and modern asides.
It is no surprise that Freema Agyeman’s feisty and emotionally capricious Olivia has rejected Bally Gill’s self-absorbed Orsino and his protestations of love for the youthfully malleable charms of the cross-dressing Viola, Gwyneth Keyworth. In notable contrast to their showy, love-sick affectations is the selfless sincerity of the doomed passion expressed by ill-fated Antonio for the man he dragged from the sea, Sebastian.
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