A MIDSUMMER NIGHT'S DREAM: till November 8.
A Midsummer Night's Dream: William Shakespeare.
Comedy Theatre (0870 060 6622).
Until November 8.
Runs 2 hours 50 minutes.
Review: Heather Neill.
The performances are engaged and engaging: you have a real treat - enjoy.
Edward Hall's Propeller Company production is a delight. Having set out on tour from their base at the Watermill in Newbury some months ago, this versatile, all-male cast offer a hilarious, swift-paced, well-honed version of Shakespeare's account of muddled love.
Hall's approach, avoiding the sentimental, might have dwindled into mere burlesque, but so engaged and engaging are the performances that the text - beautifully spoken, incidentally - could not be better served. The physicality of the playing - there is much tumbling in and out of white-legged heaps doesn't for a moment detract from the clarity of the narrative. Evincing all the sincerity of children who really, really believe in their fantasy game, the actors effortlessly take the audience with them on an imaginative journey whose comedy and magic are the stuff of pure theatre.
Dressed in what appear to be white vests and longjohns, over which they slip skirts for female characters or aprons for the mechanicals, the company silently watch the audience arrive. Their set (designs by Michael Pavelka) is a semi-circle of white ladders topped with white chairs. A trap in the centre of the stage is sometimes covered by a silver box out of which Puck ( a mesmerising,
mischievous, balletic, doll-faced Simon Scardifield) emerges. Doubling is judiciously handled among the 14 players: Scardifield is also Starveling, for instance, and Jonathan McGuinness both a serious, tentative Hermia and a whispering Lion/Snug. The actors playing the female lovers - Robert Hands is a substantial Helena - make no attempt to caricature women's behaviour and yet are
quite believable in their frights, desires and jealousies.
This is ensemble playing at its best, and it is almost a shame to pick out individuals, but Tony Bell's innocent, eager Bottom hits the mark, while Guy Williams as Oberon and Richard Clothier as Titania are properly powerful as rulers of the kingdom in which much of the action takes place.
Add a little sparkly fairy dust and judicious use of xylophone and harmonica and you have a real treat. Enjoy.
Theseus: Matt Flynn.
Hippolyta: Emilio Doorgasingh.
Hermia/Snug: Jonathan McGuinness.
Lysander: Dugald Bruce-Lockhart.
Helena: Robert Hands.
Demetrius/Snout: Vincent Leigh.
Bottom: Tony Bell.
Quince/Egeus: Chris Myles.
Flute: Jules Werner.
Oberon: Guy Williams.
Titania: Richard Clothier.
Puck/Starveling: Simon Scardifield.
Fairy: Alasdair Craig.
Fairy: Alexander Giles.
Director: Edward Hall.
Associate director: Heather Davies.
Designer: Michael Pavelka.
Lighting: Ben Ormerod.
Music: Tony Bell, Dugald Bruce-Lockhart, Jules Werner.
2003-08-15 20:13:50