The Two Gentlemen of Verona review – less smut, more mutt in RSC's delightful dog day afternoon

The Guardian

2 days ago

In the movie Shakespeare in Love, the theatre owner Philip Henslowe outlines the formula of his new star dramatist, including 'mistaken identities … a bit with a dog, and love triumphant'. As the film is set in 1593, the reference by screenwriters Marc Norman and Tom Stoppard is clearly to The Two Gentlemen of Verona in which romances overcome deceit and disguise and the clown Launce has a canine companion, Crab, who is prone to steal the show.
During times of tight cultural budgets, such as now, there is an old theatre joke about the RSC being forced to put on One Gentlemen of Verona. Joanna Bowman's revival doesn't quite go that far but has radically cut the text (removing some but not all smut, the antisemitism and some sub-par poetry) for a running time advertised at 80 minutes but in performance 90. The aim is to attract younger audiences: the evening show time is a bedtime-friendly 5pm.
Parents and teachers will perhaps advise their charges not to find templates for future relationships in the ruthless trickery between friends Valentine (Jonny Khan) and Proteus (Lance West) when both fall for Sylvia (Siân Stephens), prompting Proteus to fool cruelly current girlfriend Julia (Aisha Goodman). As Stephens is making a professional stage debut and the other three are also early in their careers, this confident and engaging quartet suggest the RSC has access to a flow of future talent.
And, as ever, they do well to compete with the bit with the dog. Bowman and stage-handler Launce (a gamely upstaged Stu McLoughlin) completely fail to make Lossi, a silver haired lady lurcher, the 'sourest-natured dog that lives' as Crab is called in the text. Lossi draws an instant 'Aaaah!' from young and some older throats, especially when giving a presumably impromptu wide yawn during one of the longer speeches.
Although some scholars make rigorous cases for the play being underrated, it seems reasonable to infer that Shakespeare was relying on Crab to divert the audience from sections that might have done with a refill of the quill. The director follows suit by adding other hectic distractions when the dog is not on. Actors slide down poles on Francis O'Connor's two-tier scaffolded set and, in the multitalented cast of 10, only Lossi doesn't play an instrument. The act four song, Who Is Sylvia?, usually a solo, becomes a full production number (composer John Patrick Elliott, music director Dan de Cruz) with guitars, violin and chorales.
In Shakespeare in Love, the dramatist informs an appalled Henslowe that there will be 'no dog at all' in Romeo and Juliet. But, if there were awards for onstage dogs (the Bonies?), Lossi would win one and the RSC should probably check out the possibility of walkies-on roles elsewhere in the canon. Until then, she and her human co-stars provide a late summer afternoon's dream.
At The Other Place, Stratford-upon-Avon, until 31 August