Shakespearean Summer

I watched two Shakespeare plays in two days; there was a lot of blood!

King Lear – National Theatre - £5

Classic case of a king trying to divide his kingdom amongst heirs without causing World War III. Surprisingly all his heirs are women and the process drives him crazy. Lear is a long-old play, the first half alone is a hefty two hours complete with barbarism, butchery, and in this case, a full-sized deer carcass! King Lear considers issues of nature vs nurture, the all-consuming nature of power and the barbarous lengths people will go to in order to secure it.

Mendes has truly lent his Bond-style influence to Shakespeare’s text;  Lear’s retinue in monochrome berets and boots with every pocket knife was bloodied, and the women don’t go halves on the lace, or the butt kicking other. The staging as ever with the NT was imaginative and excellently executed complete with revolving staging, moving panels, AV and the mandatory trap door.  But the credit here really must go to the actors who  were very good; I’ve never seen King Lear nor read the play but they made it come alive in a real way that I could follow. There were several famous names in there, Adrian Scarborough is a witty fool and its pleasing to see Anna Maxwell Martin escape her Jane Austin costume and become this wild, powerful heiress.

I really enjoyed King Lear, although there's more violence and nudity than an average episode of Game of Thrones and is a mammoth 3-hours long (the first 2 of which take place without pause or break!). 

(Photo credit: Upstate Films)

Antony and Cleopatra - The Globe - £15

Two world-leaders fall in love, what really reigns love or power? The play charts Antony's rise and fall in a strongly poetic style. Antony and Cleopatra will be your jam if you like innuendo, artistic depictions of warfare, suicide involving snakes. Having studied this play at school I at least knew what we going on, but my sister had to come to me for minute long synopses at the end of each scene.

(Clive Wood and Eve Best. Photo credit: The Guardian)

The joy of watching Shakespeare at the Globe is that sense of watching Shakespeare in its authentic style. As we arrived incense was pouring out, suffocating all the standing audience. We gratefully took our seats to one side of the stage on our rented cushions. On top of the incense there was plenty of impressive acrobatics and simple set changes that were very effective. My favourite part of the play was just before the interval when Antony and Cleopatra leave the auditorium in splendour. Something as simple as gold confetti created this amazing, glorious effect. The other great pleasure of this style of theatre is it allows the actors to be responsive to their environment. Eve Best (Cleopatra) did this really well, pausing before starting her big speech to allow planes to pass overhead, kissing an audience member on the lips when he played along. These little additions really knit the audience into the story and help you feel you have witnessed something unique.

Antony and Cleopatra was great, I think the lovely sunshine definitely helped, and the aeroplanes and pigeons stopped short of ruining the performance. My only criticisms would be the long political conversations between magnates were a little stagnant and tricky to follow. For a play in the Elizabethan style it was good. Fork out for a seat! It would be pretty long stood up!