It's a man's world in the Welsh Forest of Arden
As You Like It, Royal Shakespeare Theatre, Stratford, until November 7. Directed by Daniel Evans.
Review by Julie Chamberlain.
Shakespeare’s plays were originally performed with all-male casts, but this production’s return to the men-only stage does not mean it is taking a traditional approach to the play.
The plot, which involves Rosalind going into hiding dressed as a boy, then encountering Orlando, her secret love and offering to teach him how to woo his love (who IS Rosalind) always has homo-erotic overtones. Here they are played out much more overtly, and camply, with suggestive looks, movements and stage directions.
Director Daniel Evans has said that by everyone being one gender it is easier to focus on the main theme of the play, which he sees as love. However, when one of the four female characters is overplayed as more of a drag queen than a woman, it can detract from that.
In a more sensitive approach, Evans has moved the action from the Forest of Arden to Wales, which gives the opportunity to perform a number of the musical pieces as Welsh, multi-voiced hymns, and these are also good in providing a break from the comedy.
Apart from the jokes and comedy lines in the play – which often don’t work with a twenty-first century audience – there has been much more humour written in, often created from just a look, a gesture, or a suggestive stage movement. A performance of Raye’s Where Is My Husband! Went down a storm with most of the crowd but seemed a jarring note, moving too far from the original text.
Jonathan Groff is the award-winning American star taking the role of Rosalind, banished from court and seeking to live in secret in the forest. He dominates the stage, and his boy-scout-style ‘disguise’ is very camp. Gary Wilmot is commanding as Duke Frederick, who has cast out his brother to the forest, but he is oddly less stage-grabbing when also appearing as the thrown-out brother, Duke Senior. Fisayo Akinado has great comic timing to turn the part of Rosalinde’s cousin Celia from a supportive one to taking a huge number of laughs.
As melancholy nobleman Jacques, Richard McCabe is theatrical and clever, delivering the ‘all the world’s a stage’ speech with understated control, and Tim Preston as Phoebe, is very funny as the girl who mistakenly falls for Rosalind in her boy disguise.
The fantastic sets deserve a round of applause of their own. The court is stark and Orlando’s boxing fight is staged in a dramatic moving boxing ring; the transformation to the Forest of Arden and its multilevel waving grasses is impressive.
In 2019, announcing a move to promote diversity, the RSC staged As You Like It with women playing several of the male roles, regional accents and one deaf performer; this production is the latest attempt to breathe new life into a 427-year old play and although not perfect is fun and well-acted.
For tickets and more information: https://www.rsc.org.uk/as-you-like-it/
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