Antony and Cleopatra. Part 2 (Theatre Royal Newcastle, 15th October 2010)

On the 15th October matinée, Katy Stephens (text in hand) took on the role of Cleopatra in the RSC Antony and Cleopatra when Kathryn Hunter ‘was indisposed’.  Though for most of the scenes Katy Stephens held the book in her hand, she only looked at the script now and again to remind herself of  odd lines. I felt that Katy Stephens’ portrayal of  Cleopatra was much more emotional than Kathryn Hunter’s and she didn’t play the comedy as much.  On Antony’s death there were tears in her eyes.  At times Katy Stephens was a little uncomfortable in the way she stood.  However, watching her demonstrated that two different approaches to a character can work within the same production.  I felt there was certainly a lot of chemistry between Stephen’s Cleopatra and Darrell D’Silva’s Antony.

The shuffle that inevitably comes from an understudy taking on a key role resulted in some real treats.  My favourite was Greg Hicks taking on the role of the messenger Thidias. It was a lovely performance, and Hicks seemed to revel in the part, flirting with Cleopatra and taking notes in Rome with great relish.  Tunji Kasim  (normally Mardian) gave a very sound performance as Eros and I felt that this was better casting than the eunuch and even Edmund.

There were a couple of moments that didn’t seem to go to plan.  At one point Alexas was not on stage when he was asked to find out information from the messenger and the gun did not go off when Cleopatra shot at the messenger.  Maybe the safety catch was still on or because Katy Stephens hadn’t practised that much they didn’t want to take the risk.

When an understudy takes on a role, there is a bit of observing the blocking and some mimicking of the way lines are said by the original actor.  On the other hand, there is also a sense of the actor trying to bring their interpretation to the role.  The RSC policy is for the ensemble to understudy other parts. It’s enormous undertaking to understudy Cleopatra as well as play Regan and Rosalind.  In the past two years I have seen Ed Bennett’s Hamlet, Mariah Gale’s Rosalind, and Dyfan Dwyfor’s Romeo. I have also seen the understudy performance of Twelfth Night.  What the understudy does is give a very different perspective of a role in a production.  For example, I thought that Dyfan Dwyfor’s Romeo was much measured and quieter than Sam Troughton’s.  I was really pleased to see Katy Stephens play Cleopatra and in future she may get the opportunity to really make the part her own.

My review of the production with Kathryn Hunter

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Antony and Cleopatra, Part 1 (The Courtyard Theatre, Theatre Royal Newcastle May to October 2010)

When I saw Antony and Cleopatra in Stratford, I felt that Artistic Director, Michael Boyd’s vision of  the RSC ensemble and how it should be put into reality seemed to come to fruition in the production. The house lights are up for most of the production creating a real awareness of the audience watching.  The vomitaria are used a lot for entrances and exits.  Soldiers launched themselves from the circle into battle.  Actors who are experienced, and who have been cast in lead roles in other productions, were playing smaller parts.  These included Greg Hicks as the Soothsayer and Katy Stephens as a fascinating Eros who delights in the partying  and ends up firmly tied up in the tragedy.

The production starts with the dimming of the house lights and Antony and Cleopatra chasing each other onto the stage. Shifting the focus moves straight onto Antony and Cleopatra from the very beginning.  The loss of the Roman frame right at the start of the production changes the perspective of the scene.  Though the Romans do appear straight after to comment on the two lovers, this slight amendement, presents Antony and Cleopatra directly to the audience, rather than through the Roman eyes.  This is important because many of the negative comments about Cleopatra are from the mouths of the Romans, and by placing Antony and Cleopatra directly in the spotlight the audience are asked to judge them for themselves. The staging of the opening scene reminds me that in their most private moments, Antony and Cleopatra are never alone. We are watching as the Romans and the Egyptian court observe the fickleness and attraction of this relationship and by lighting the audience the public nature of the events is emphasised by widening the on stage audience to us.

I felt that the chemistry between Kathryn Hunter’s Cleopatra and Darrell D’Silva’s  Antony has become more evident as the production has developed over the past few months.  Together they highlight that this is the story of two older people who find each other very sexy, and can’t concentrate on anything but each other.  Just watch Enrobarbus’s (Brian Doherty)  reaction to Agrippa’s  (Geoffrey Freshwater) declaration that Antony should marry Octavia and hear his emphatic ‘never’ at the suggestion that Antony will now leave Cleopatra, to know how much Antony is really tied to his Egyptian queen.

The cigar smoking Antony is not at home in either Rome of Egypt.  He clearly loves the party and in this production Bacchus is his god.  Like the other Romans, he wears a suit in Rome but he looks very uncomfortable in it, so when he’s drinking on Pompey’s ship, he commands the scene wearing his little sailor hat to undermine the formality.  When he is in Egypt wearing his army uniform, he is the great soldier who can no longer win the battles.  His death is both tragic and comic at the same time.  I could weep when Eros kills himself instead of stab the dishonoured Antony, but feel frustrated that Antony cannot even kill himself.  In winching his dying bulk up to Cleopatra’s monument, the scene becomes comic.

Kathryn Hunter is not a stereotypical Cleopatra. She’s doesn’t try to mimic the  Elizabeth Taylor and Vivien Leigh view of Cleopatra.  As a small actress she uses her physical appearance to great effect.  Her moods are as changeable as her clothes, but her intelligence and quick wit come over well.  I like the accent and  her lines are spoken with passion and energy. Not one line is underplayed.  .

It’s not just Kathryn Hunter and Darrell D’Silva that give strong performances in this production.  Their love affair is played out against a background of war and politics which span the ancient world and it is the very solid performances from the rest of the cast, and the excellent blocking of scenes, that make this production work so well.

The scene changes are cleverly thought through as they alternates between Egypt and Rome.  The moment when it looked like Pompey was pointing his gun at Caesar as the scene shifted from one place to another was brilliant.  The drinking scene taking place on Pompey’s ship is wonderfully staged, including dimming the lights and focusing on Menas as he reveals his murderous plot to Pompey.  Clarence Smith brings Pompey alive and we really feel he is so volatile and he could easily explode and break his pact with the three Romans  at any time.  The production also finds a solution to how do you stage a battle on stage?  The dance with the paper ships is very effective way of doing this.

Sandy Neilson’s Lepidus is unable to hold his drink and staggers and slurs in the drinking scene.  He delights at the crocodile story.  How strange the crocodile would have sounded to the Elizabethans?  The night on Pompey’s ship is the start of  his embarrassing downfall, which was exemplified as he was  placed in the spotlight above the stage the doors slowly closing on his to signal his execution.

John Mackay used his height to great effect when playing Octavius Caesar, making him seem uncomfortable in company and often having to lower his head as he entered centre stage.   He is emotional at the loss of his sister and unable to take his drink.  At the end of the play he is the sole ruler of the world.   Changing from the black polar neck to shirt and tie showed that even in his supposedly private moments he was still very self-aware of his image.  As an audience we are supposed to think that his feelings for Octavia is more than brotherly.  he displays fury at Antony’s betrayal and he recounts the messengers stories of Antony’s behaviours  in Egypt with great clarity and anger. 

Paul Hamilton’s messenger contributes to one of the highlights of the production.  Terrified of the knife wielding, gun firing Cleopatra, he sticks to his text the best way he can.  His determination to give his message shows that there is an etiquette around messengers and that’s why the beating of  Thidias later in the play is brutal and humiliating .

I’m always amazed by Phillip Edgerley’s character acting and that he can look so different.  His  Menas and his  Proculeius were like chalk cheese – the ruffian pirate and the smart  Roman diplomat.

One thing I find a little confusing was Sophie Russell  doubling up as Octavia and a Roman soldier.  Clearly this wasn’t intended to mean Octavia was alos a Roman soldier, but could be taken that way.

I saw this production in Stratford and Newcastle and like the other long ensemble productions it has benefited from its development through time.  I really sat on the fence when it came to saying whether I liked or not.  I was unsure whether I found it engaging or not, because I had such mixed feelings about it.  However, every time I saw it, I went away thinking a lot about it.  I think now I’m hooked.  What felt, at first, like a slow bland first half has speeded up and the episodic nature of the play in its shifts between Rome and Egypt are highlighted to great effect.

My next blog discusses the matinée performance on Saturday 15th October when Katy Stephens played Cleopatra.

Reviews and Previews

RSC Antony and Cleopatra in The Times
RSC Antony and Cleopatra in Evening Standard
The Stage review of RSC Antony and Cleopatra
RSC Antony and Cleopatra in The Guardian
Antony and Cleopatra in the Observer (int with Kathryn Hunter)
Antony and Cleopatra in the FT
RSC Antony and Cleopatra Press Night delayed (The Stage)
RSC’s Antony and Cleopatra in The Telegraph
http://www.whatsonstage.com/reviews/theatre/london/E8831273655592/Antony+%26+Cleopatra+%28RSC%29.htm

Julie Raby3 Comments

RSC, South Bank Show (ITV 1, 28th December 2009)

Though I enjoyed the South Bank programme about the Royal Shakespeare Company (RSC)  because of my interest in the Company and its work, I did start to feel that it was more like a promotional DVD, than an in-depth study.  It is sad to see a long running show axed and I hope other shows take its place, and that we see Melvin Bragg in other slots.  I think I need more of the wonderful Culture Show with its weekly mix of short pieces and specials, such as the recent programme focusing on Michael Jackson.  However, though entertaining, this episode of the South Bank show  was not really challenging and it didn’t reveal things about the RSC, that I didn’t know already from reading interviews with Michael Boyd and from the RSC’s own publicity material.  Maybe the overall description of the programme was ‘on message’ as far as the RSC was concerned.

I found the trip to Russia and the background to The Grain Store very interesting.  I also thought that it was great to see actors in rehearsal and to watch the  bit on how the new theatre is progressing.   I thought it was amusing that Mariah Gale and Katy Stephens practice their speeches in funny voices.   However, alongside all this interesting nuggets of information, I felt that the main purpose of the programme was to promote the RSC’s current vision.  The programme highlighted the committment to the ensemble idea and the rationale behind the new theatre space.  Michael Boyd reiterated his distaste of celebrity culture, which he has mentioned in other places.   The programme also gave us the reason why the RSC are committed to  performing new writing and linked all this back to Peter Hall’s vision for the RSC.  What the programme didn’t seem to do was critique the new direction or really place this in the context of other ways that the RSC could evolve and develop.

The idea of the ensemble brings massive benefits, and of course The Histories project is used to as an example to support this approach.  It will be great to see this year’s ensemble at work in new plays next year.  However, it is also very exciting to see new actors and new approaches.  I have written in previous places on the blog that I feel that the ensemble is not making enough of the opportunity to take ideas across more than one play as Greg Doran did in the 2008 season with his utilisation of the mirrored set for three productions.  This ensemble company had been split into two and are in effect, until the Russian plays, two separate companies as far as I could see in the way they approached The Winter’s Tale, As You Like It and Julius Caesar.   Only having the one theatre has meant that there isn’t as much productions.  in 2010, this year’s productions will be repeated and joined by new productions, but with the same actors.   There are benefits of seeing the company play in different spaces and though I love The Courtyard, I  miss smaller spaces like The Other Place and I would love to see a production at The Swan again when it reopens. 

In addition, to the commitment to the ensemble, the new theatre space, the RSC do embrace other approaches.  They do bring in new companies during the ensemble run such as the wonderful Twelfth Night this autumn.  I have also written about how well the RSC productions transfer to the proscenium arch space and maybe it is a positive thing that the RSC can work on the thrust stage as well as in the traditional theatres it also uses.  Finally, I know that some actors had built up a reputation in the theatre before becoming celebrities due to television work, but actors such as David Tennant and Richard Wilson bring enormous benefits to the RSC as does the current RSC ensemble approach.

Reviews

What’s On Stage review

Julie Raby1 Comment

Hamlet (BFI, 14th December 2009)

I felt that I was privileged to be able to attend the premiere of the Illuminations/BBC TV film version of Greg Doran’s RSC Hamlet at the BFI  (British Film Institute).  This blog is about the experience of being there at the screening, and I’ll wait until after the Boxing Day, when it is aired on TV, to blog about the detail of the production.  Here I am interested in discussing the evening, the atmosphere and responding to seeing the film version for the very first time.

My initial thoughts are around how the film and stage versions might differ and whether the memory of the film version might start to erode that of the stage version.  I thought that the stage production of Greg Doran’s RSC Hamlet (2008-09), was particularly engaging  because I felt that the audience was part of the production itself.  As the audience entered the auditorium, they could see themselves in the mirrored set and as the play progressed audience members became  guests at the funeral/wedding, and the audience for the ‘Mousetrap’.  I was lucky to see the stage version five times through the run, and I was fortunate to see it in the different theatre spaces at the Courtyard and Novello theatres.  What made revisiting the production and sitting in different parts of the Courtyard really interesting was to be able to see the production from lots of different perspectives.  Following experiencing the stage version in Stratford, seeing it at the Novello presented another perspective as it was viewed through the frame of the proscenium arch.   So when I watched the film version, I was fascinated in the way that the camera seemed to direct he viewer to watch characters in specific ways rather than let the eye wonder as it does in the theatre.   It felt that watching the film was the antithesis of watching on stage where the eye can wonder to look at character reactions, watch actors waiting to come on stage, watch the action from behind, above or in front.   The film becomes very directive in the way the viewer is positioned closing down possible viewing options available in the theatre, but emphasising others.  The camera directs us to moments that maybe became noticeable after a second or third visit to the theatre.  For example, Polonius mouthing Laertes lines in 1.2  to make it clear that this is a staged Polonius family moment, or replicated later when Hamlet mouths the Player King’s lines making it really clear this is the bit her wrote.  What I found fascinating was that the film version  takes us onto the set and we become part of the court.  In 1.1, I thought the camera was using all those conventions of horror film and we were looking through the ghost’s eyes, but it was us that looked over Horatio’s shoulders.  In the Q&A session after the screening, Greg Doran talked bout how he found editing and had made a conscious decision to direct the viewer in certain ways.

The other thing that was so different from the stage production ws the way space was used.    The stage is so open at the Courtyard, there is just the back wall, and it’s the language and a few chairs etc that creates the sense of place,  but in the film we have a sense of a building and the action moving from room to room.   I felt at the end of the film, I could actually find my way round this building.  In the Q &A session, Mark Lawson commented that the location was clearly important and Greg Doran talked about getting the sense of a place that felt claustrophobic.  It felt strange suddenly going outside for the gravedigger’s scene, but this does reinforce that idea of the building and space smothering Hamlet.  I think it has been a good decision not to just film the stage version, but to move the play onto location and to think about the kind of place that Hamlet has to deal with as well as the psychological torment that he was dealing with.

The stage version was concerned with metatheatre and this is still very present in the film with the entrance of the player, John Woodvine’s wonderful Priam speech with the actors joining in as if they’d done this so many times like this before and the hilariously funny dumb show as part of the play within the play.  In the film, Greg Doran has also introduced lots of references to film and there are echoes of Michael Almereyda’s 2000 Hamlet all the way through including the dramatic moment of Polonius’ death which is retained from the stage version.   In contrast to the film version, there’s an interesting shift in mood at ‘Now I am alone’ and a twist which I’ll discuss after Boxing Day, but this is an aspect the film could take forward that the stage production didn’t.

David Tennant plays Hamlet as a self harming, hot-tempered intellectual, and it is very unnerving that he carries such sharp knife around with him.  As well s being so intense,  David Tennant’s Hamlet is very witty and funny.  However, it was  Oliver Ford Davies’ Polonius got the most laughs of the evening.  I think that this was highlighted by being able to bring the camera right up to him as he presents his view of the events which is often at odds with everyone elses .

Mark Lawson chaired the Q&A session really well and asked some very perspective questions.  The session will be on the BFI website soon, so we can all watch again.  I asked the first question which was about the camera placing he viewer on stage.  There wasn’t a Doctor Who question and maybe this was a relief to Mark Lawson, especially as had he’d written on the problems of seeing Hamlet through the lens of Doctor Who at the end of last year.  For me, part of the interest in this production is making connections between these two  roles, and that is why I am writing on length on this in other places.  However, the film both distanced  David Tennant from the Doctor Who role, while on the other hand reinforced some of those readings of the two texts.

In the Q &A session, Greg  Doran admitted to cutting the entrance of Fortinbras at the end.  This did lead to a rather abrupt ending.  Maybe we did need a little time to ponder on Hamlet’s death even though we had been watching for over three hours by then.  After the screening, there was a discussion about whether Hamlet was mad or not in this production.  I don’t think he is mad, but I think that Greg Doran’s point about Hamlet going over the edge in Getrude’s chamber was an interesting one.  The reason that I don’t think that David Tennant’s Hamlet has gone mad is because he manages to interact so differently with the different characters.  We see him play the clown in scenes with Polonius and then turn to Horatio and have a serious conversation.

When I decided to go to the screening, it felt a bit extravagant booking to see a film that would be on television in a week’s time.  However, the experience of being there was just an exciting as seeing the film.   I found it absolutely fascinating to be sat behind Patrick Stewart watching himself playing Claudius watching Hamlet who is watching Claudius in the ‘Mousetrap’.   Even though this was three hours and three minutes long, it  felt that the time went by really quickly and the audience clapped at the end of the film expressing their delight in what they had just seen.

Greg Doran talked about productions he’d seen years ago still being in his head.  I think that I worry a little that the stage memory will be eventually erased from my memory by the film version as I can still keep watching the DVD.  However, that’s the transience of theatre, the joy of being one of many  who saw and felt that they were part of the stage production, in contrast to the possible millions who will experience the watching this on DVD.  The great thing about the film version is that it is different from the stage production, but it does retain so much of the blocking from the stage versions.  Some to the key elements of the stage production are there in the film such as the ‘real’ skull, the red T shirt, the two-way mirrors, and the player king’s crown. 

As Patrick Stewart said in the Q&A session, the cast had been ‘rehearsing’ this for a year, so the film can only be a very polished performance.   Yes in the film there were jerky moments and bits were cut and it does end a little abruptly, but it is a lovely version of Hamlet, which presents an engaging interpretation of the text and I think will make Shakespeare more accessible to a wider audience.

The BBC spokesperson said the BBC wanted this to have a long life after the production had been screened on Boxing Day and after seeing the film production, I think it will.

Further Information

BFI question and answer

BBC web site tie in

Hamlet BBC Open Learn with reference to the production.

George Entwistle’s BBC Blog on the BFI screening

Illuminations – reviews blogs tweets etc about the production

Illuminations Blog

Interview with David Tennant in Observer

Mark Lawson on the TV version in The Guardian

Mark Lawson on Hamlet for The Guardian discussion about the Doctor Who Hamlet?

RSC Countdown to Hamlet site

The Times on Hamlet at Christmas

Julie Raby4 Comments

As You Like It (Theatre Royal Newcastle, 24th October 2009)

photo 5
Fans queue to see Katie Price at Newcastle book signing

Outside Waterstone’s in Newcastle, young women wearing clothes with flashes of pink, are queuing to see Katie Price signing copies of her new novel.   The former glamour model, who is also known as Jordan, experiments with different identities, and  she could be described as an independent woman making it on her own in the savage and brutal world of a celebrity-focused culture.  About 100 yards away from where Katie Price is about to undertake her book signing for her fans, another Katie prepares to take the stage as another independent woman who also experiments and explores different identities.  As the fans queue to meet Jordan, Kay Stephens is about to play Rosalind in the RSC’s inventive and interesting interpretation of As You Like It.

I have written about the RSC’s As You Like It before and the other two productions I saw at The Globe and The Curve, Leicester earlier this year, and it felt that seeing the RSC again in Newcastle is like visiting an old friend.   One of the exciting things about seeing an RSC production in Newcastle, is to see a production in a different space from The Courtyard Theatre.  I felt that Michael Boyd’s As You Like It has transferred beautifully to the Newcastle Theatre Royal’s  proscenium arch space.  Some of the key ideas behind the Courtyard space are retained such as keeping the house lights on through most of the production.  As Newcastle’s Theatre Royal  isn’t a very large theatre, seats aren’t too far from the stage even at the back of the stalls which is in keeping with having the audience close to the performance.   The overall vision and aesthetic of the production is retained in the new space.  It’s still a bleak winter world in the Forest of Arden.  In being able to move a production out of the Courtyard does make me think a little of the Courtyard experiment and how experimental it is if the productions transfer so well.

There are some problems to be overcome in the new space.  How do you get Audrey and Touchstone on stage for the wedding, especially in that skirt for example?   In Newcastle, the couple had  to make their entrance for their wedding by squeezing by people very close to the stage on Row B and Audrey has to find a free seat arm to stand on.  There are other entrances and exits that have to be changed and characters now enter from the aisles in the auditorium instead of the vomitoria.

The formal court scene early in the play worked really well on this stage  as  proscenium space promotes the sense of order and formality in the scene.   Nevertheless that formality didn’t undermine other less formal moments.  The surprises in this production continue to work well in Newcastle.  Forbes Masson’s wonderful cynical Jaques enters centre stage as he does in Stratford paying his guitar.  I’m sure that he managed to prolong the ‘more’ with the Newcastle audience much longer than I saw him do in Stratford.  His seven ages of man speech is delivered in a very original way.  Corin’s skinning of the rabbit after the interval has to be carried out with the audience all in front of him.  An addition in Newcastle is that Touchstone adds his ‘Meat is Murder’ sign alongside Orlando’s love poetry.

Some members of the audience  gasped when they saw the dress that Rosalind wears for her wedding.  It didn’t look like anything Katie Price would wear, but it was elegant and at the same time simple.  The embroidered  flowers picked up the designs in the other character’s clothes.   The dress signified Rosalind’s transformation, and  she does not return to the formal clothes she wore at the start of the play.   Nevertheless, Rosalind has made her mark and got her way and she speaks the epilogue as well.  In many ways both Katie Price and Katy Stephens’ Rosalind are role models for young women, but they are women who also play a part so that they can succeed.

Julie Raby2 Comments