DIDO QUEEN OF CARTHAGE To 2 June.
London.
DIDO QUEEN OF CARTHAGE
by Christopher Marlowe.
Cottesloe Theatre In rep to 2 June 2009.
Mon-Sat 7.30 Mat 2.30 14 April, 6, 27 May 2.30pm.
Audio-described 24 April, 25 April 2.30pm.
Captioned 5 May.
Runs 2hr 55min One interval.
TICKETS: 020 7452 3000
www.nationaltheatre.org.uk/tickets
Review: Carole Woddis 26 March.
Modern jars with classical at times.
We need our Greek myths. They tell stories about the human condition with a clarity that has never been equalled. And nothing much has changed in 2000 years of human behaviour.
James Macdonald’s revival of Christopher Marlowe’s reworking of the Dido and Aeneas story is reminder of these verities and of the modernity both of the myths and Marlowe’s remarkable handling of the story of two lovers torn asunder by the fickleness of the Fates/gods and goddesses. Also striking, as others have remarked, is how Shakespeare reworked Marlowe’s treatments for his own purposes.
This Dido is filled with pre-echoes of A Midsummer Night’s Dream and Antony and Cleopatra. It’s impossible not to think of the former when watching Siobhan Redmond’s Venus assuming a Titania/Oberon-like role with love potions (Marlowe’s Dido was published in 1594; The Dream a year later in 1595), and of the latter in the love-sick agonies of Mark Bonnar’s grizzled Trojan warrior Aeneas, tossed hither and thither by love and war, and Anastasia Hille’s mercurial Carthagian queen Dido.
Latching on to Marlowe’s modernity, Macdonald’s production is self-consciously anti-romantic, mixing the contemporary (and regional) with the classic. It doesn’t entirely work. It may capture the author’s racy scepticism but in a story of gods, headstrong emotions and magical conjurations, credibility and wonder sometimes become mortally strained.
Moritz Junge’s beautiful east Mediterranean fabrics and Orlando Gough’s characteristically cheeky songs offer some kind of consolation, as do the fine performances of Bonnar and Hille. If they sometimes seem an unlikely pairing, Bonnar provides a convincing, Scots-accented portrait of battle-torn exhaustion and confusion whilst Hille, at first controlled, then frantic, brings an intense emotional freedom to Dido. Siân Brooke as Dido’s sister, Anna and Susan Engel as Juno also provide outstanding support
In the end, like a recent revival of Howard Barker’s Greek-tinged The Dying of Today, you come away reminded of the extraordinary power of story-telling. To feel history’s dark stain, the terrible blood and gore of martial conflict, you don’t have to see it: you just have to listen to the account. It is enough.
Jupiter/Ilioneus: Alan David.
Ganymede/Sergestus: Ryan Sampson.
Mercury or Hermes: Kyle McPhail.
Venus: Siobhan Redmond.
Cupid: Ceallach Spellman/Theo Stevenson.
Juno/Nurse: Susan Engel.
Aeneas: Mark Bonnar.
Ascanius: Freddie Hill/Thomas Patten.
Achates: Stephen Kennedy.
Cloanthus: Gary Carr.
Dido: Anastasia Hille.
Anna: Siân Brooke.
Iarbas: Oba Abili
Trojan/Singer/Lord: Jake Arditti.
Musicians: Richard Boothby, Graeme Taylor.
Director: James Macdonald.
Designer: Tobias Hoheisel.
Lighting: Adam Silverman.
Sound: Christopher Shutt.
Music: Orlando Gough.
Movement: Steven Hoggett and Imogen Knight for Frantic Assembly.
Costume: Moritz Junge.
Company voice work: Kate Godfrey.
2009-04-08 00:45:05