A darkly delicious Christmas retelling of Shakespeare’s raucous gender-swapping comedy.
Twelfth Night | Royal Shakespeare Theatre (Stratford-upon-Avon) | 7th of December
Reviewed by Paul Knowles and Edith Powell
Undoubtedly, this is one of the most confident, raucous, and dazzling productions of Shakespeare that we have watched over the last few years. The costumes, lighting, and staging are all extraordinarily on point, allowing the whole cast to shine in a production with no weak performances. The play’s opening action of Viola (Gwyneth Keyworth) washing up on the shore, highlights the wonderful eye for detail behind this production. Her purple coat is sodden, and drips water onto the stage, adding a visceral reality to her bewilderment at being saved. Her agony at her brother, Sebastian, being lost at sea is captured by Keyworth’s mature and understated performance, never slipping into overwrought or unbelievable.
Assuredly, however, this version of Twelfth Night is fully concerned with the relationship between Feste and Malvolio and Shakespeare’s exploration of whether it is better to be ‘a witty fool, than a foolish wit’. Michael Grady-Hall gives a scene stealing performance as Feste, from the moment he descends from a rope onto the stage singing the newly commissioned piece of music by Matt Maltese ‘Maybe This Christmas’. Grady-Hall captures the melancholy and musicality of Feste, and his performance ‘Of the Wind and The Rain’ which concludes Twelfth Night is one of the finest pieces of theatre we have ever had the pleasure to watch. Samuel West offers a generous performance as Malvolio, acting as the perfect straight man to Grady-Hall and loveable-drunken Sir Toby Belch, played with bawdy gusto by Joplin Sibtain, the knightly flop Sir Andrew Aguecheek (Demetri Goritsas) and the wonderful scheming Fabin (Daniel Millar). Freema Agyeman delivers a powerhouse performance as the grief-stricken Olivia who turns into an infatuated love-fool after sparring and falling for Viola, disguised as Cesario. Viola is wooing Olivia on behalf of Duke Orsino, approached with understated dignity by Bally Gill. The scenes between the two sparkle with wit and chemistry, making believable the growing feelings of romance between them.
The stunning staging is based upon the work of Illyria and Edward Gorey capturing the melancholy and melody that runs through this RSC production of Twelfth Night. From the opening black and white stage, which opens up to reveal the grave site of Olivia’s brother, the staging is flawless. We are then reintroduced to Feste as he tumbles down a hill, taken straight out of a children’s cartoon. We then move onto the sheer brilliance of the moment Feste conjures a fully operational organ onto the stage, which houses secret compartments that double as the rooms in Olivia’s court. The staging is truly of the highest quality, rivalling any production of Shakespeare we have ever seen. The music is another astoundingly impressive component of this production, paying homage to one of Shakespeare’s most famous lines: ‘If music be the fruit of love play on’. Composer Matt Maltese has done a virtuoso job in capturing the madness of infatuation, the cruelty of unrequited love and the joy of finding one’s soul mate. Maltese manages to blend the conflicting, confusing and jousting emotions of the characters into the production’s score, capturing the misery and euphoria of falling in love. The two stand out numbers are the beautifully haunting ‘Wind and the Rain’ and Maltese’s original song ‘Maybe this Christmas’, which capture the despair that Christmas brings to many, but also contains the hope that things might turn out better next year.
The standout scene of the production was the confrontation between Malvolio and Feste at the end of the play. Both dressed in yellow stockings and garters, both claiming to be wronged by the other, and both claiming the higher moral ground. This scene confronts us with the universal truth, that we contain both Malvolio and Feste inside us all. We can all be full of our own self-importance, but we also contain a pessimism at being the only one who understands the true state of the world, and believe we could change things with the right circumstances It is Shakespeare’s ability to shine a light on our most secret selves that has made his work so enduringly popular.
Without any hesitation, we recommend this production of Twelfth Night as one of the must sees of the year. It is one of the finest productions of Shakespeare we have watched in the last five years. Containing breathtaking staging, outstanding original music and actors on top of their game. It also contains one of the greatest enactments of Feste, with Michael Grady-Hall giving a performance for the ages. We are confident that it will be talked about by many, for years to come. This RSC production of Twelfth Night is a darkly delicious Christmas treat that is not to be missed.
Reviewed by Paul Knowles and Edith Powell.