Twelfth Night

When: Tuesday 15th January

Where: Apollo Theatre

Why: My dear @cakespeareuk loves a man in a dress (and got up early to get us £10 day seats)

This all-male production of Twelfth Night totally rocked my socks. We got to the theatre early to watch the actors getting ready on stage – here Mark Rylance slapping his make-up on, there Stephen Fry getting his beard fiddled about with. It was a great start to the play and far from spoiling the magic it added to the feeling of authenticity and kind of emphasised the skill we were about to behold – like, you know full well you’ve just seen a modern man cramming a wig on his head, but as soon as the play starts for real it’s instantly a woman in front of you. Kind of showing off their mastery, really. And this play is such a good one to go all-male on, as it just mixes up the cross-dressing that drives the whole play and makes you understand Shakespeare’s preoccupation with it. It’s quite cool to be seeing a play performed by all men when you know that this is what it was written for and how it was always originally performed. And boy oh BOY did those boys do it well. Even the staging was original, with candle chandeliers dripping all over the actors, traditional (and luxuriant) costumes, and on-stage seating to mimic the Globe.

Sneaky stage photo

I have to go all out there and say that there was not a bad second in this production. I quite often get dozing off moments in Shakespeare (even in my beloved Much Ado, always when the fools are up), but there was none of that here. The silly, for-the-groundlings scenes with Sir Toby and Andrew Aguecheek and Maria were amongst the best, despite the scene where they plot Malvolio’s downfall bringing me violent sixth form speech and drama lesson flashbacks (“Go shake your ears!”). Roger Lloyd-Pack, skinny legged and mournful, stuck in a hedge after eavesdropping on Malvolio had me in hysterics, and Paul Chahidi’s mincing, comedy dame with a frankly astoundingly realistic cleavage was perfect as the catty and clever Maria and provided a great foil to the pompous Malvolio. Stephen Fry’s booming presence was hilarious during the picnic rug scene where he tries to seduce Olivia, but lacked a little bit of subtlety and true malevolence at the end when he swears to get his revenge – more petulant than menacing.

The true star turn was obviously Mark Rylance as Olivia, whom I had never seen but had heard gushing praise for from my flatmate and all other sources. His Olivia was flustered, full of tenderness and hesitance, passion and ridiculousness, gliding about the stage as if on casters. His doleful voice was absolute perfection and his performance seemed to transcend gender, if that doesn’t sound too stupid – you logically know it’s a male actor, and a female character, but almost it didn’t seem to matter what was going on in this performance – it was all about the character of Olivia. It was just masterful and I was suitably impressed.

The whole play was both hilarious and surprisingly romantic – the chemistry between Liam Brennan’s Orsino and Johnny Flynn’s Viola was palpable and engrossing, and their near kiss while Viola was still in her male guise was so convincingly done. Viola and Samuel Barnett’s Sebastian were beautifully played. The music and philosophical fooling provided by Peter Hamilton Dyer’s Feste were expert and moving, and he really tied up the play in its entirety, providing a constant thread in each scene and embodying the spirit of the play.

I’m so thrilled I got to see this production and am seriously crossing my fingers they release a DVD version (as with Much Ado) so that I can relive it.

Verdict: immense.

Brixpig x