A MIDSUMMER NIGHT'S DREAM. To 10 November.

London/Tour

A MIDSUMMER NIGHT’S DREAM
by William Shakespeare

The Roundhouse Chalk Farm Road NW1 8EH To 21 April
Mon-Fri 7.30pm Sat 8pm Mat Sat 2pm
then Tour to 10 November 2007

TICKETS (Roundhouse): 0870 389 1846 (£2.50 booking fee per ticket)
www.roundhouse.org.uk (£1 booking fee per ticket)
Review: Timothy Ramsden 13 March

World-class Shakespeare.
There are two elements to this Indian Dream. First, the audience-embracing story acted by a company using English and several South Asian languages. Secondly, the large-scale spectacle of ensemble scenes. Perhaps no stage is perfect for both elements; the actors induced a warm wrap-around feeling at London’s Roundhouse, though the scenic spectacle demands a more exclusively front-on experience.

Similarly, there are at least two audiences; the non-Asian British audience for whom the non-English spoken sections and cultural references may appear obscure and/or exotic, and the Indian audience (in India or elsewhere) for whom they could be as familiar as the play itself.

Every inch of this play has been trodden by fine actors. Any long-term Shakespeare-goer is likely to have memories of major players in the significant roles. What can mere theatre mortals do on stage beside such memories? Especially when this Dash Arts production, which originated in India under British director Tim Supple as a British Council initiative, has been boosted following rave reviews from its Stratford-upon-Avon visit last June as part of the RSC’s Complete Works Festival.

It’s very good, but not that good in the Roundhouse (it may well appear in other lights on its autumn British tour). But the cultural setting and language switches provide a new, different sort of energy which forms the key reason for not missing this Dream.

Gone is the familiar splenetic English outrage of Egeus against Hermia and Lysander. A more direct anger emerges, which must be a terrifying challenge to the young people. More pervasively, the usual slow country-cousin behaviour of the Mechanicals is replaced by a higher-speed, higher-energy interaction, reaching its apogee in Joy Fernandes’ Bottom, who ends up restored to human shape fondly cradling the huge phallus he’d enjoyed in his time as an ass.

And reaching its most touching in the congratulatory gestures Ashwatthama J D’s Quince gives his actors during ‘Pyramus and Thisbe’. Archana Ramaswamy’s Hippolyta/Titania, forceful, fierce yet sympathetic, is outstanding. And the lovers, so often the over-excited weak-spot, here caught in a literal maze of tape, come over particularly fresh in this memorable Dream.

Philostrate/Puck: Ajay Kumar
Hippolyta/Titania: Archana Ramaswamy
Theseus/Oberon: P R Jijoy
Egeus/Moth: J Jayakumar
Hermia: Yuki Ellias
Demetrius: Prasanna Mahagamage
Lysander: Chandan Roy Sanyal
Helena: Shanaya rafaat
Peter Quince: Ashwatthama J D
Nick Bottom: Joy Fernandes
Francis Flute: Joyraj Bhattacharya
Robin Starveling: T Gopalakrishnan
Tom Snout: Umesh Jagtap
Snug: Jitu Shastr
Peaseblossom: Faezeh Jalali
Cobweb: M Palani
Mustardseed: D Padmakumar
Dragonfly: Tapan Das
Glow Worm: Dharminder Pawar
Boy: Lakhan Pawar/Ram Paar

Director: Tim Supple
Designer/Costume: Sumant Jayakrishnan
Lighting: Zuleikha Chaudhari
Sound: Nick Lidster/Autograph
Music Director: Devissaro
Choreographer: D Padmakumar, M Palani
Assistant director: Quasar Thakore Padamsee
Assistant costume: Urvashi Bhargava

2007-03-18 10:39:40