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Telegraph
5 days ago
- Entertainment
- Telegraph
This is still the finest A Midsummer Night's Dream I have ever seen
Back in 2019, I gave five stars to Nicholas Hytner's 'immersive' production of A Midsummer Night's Dream. His achievement was to take Shakespeare's over-familiar comedy of romantic confusion – in which young lovers and bumbling am-dram actors come unstuck in the Athenian forest - and make it fun, funny, beautiful, revelatory and, yes, sexy. His master-stroke: magicking the action amid, and above, standing spectators (the rest seated), employing daring circusy high jinks. The success here is to make a proven delight – the finest Dream I've seen – stir wonder again; even if you're re-encountering the show, it still seems fresh and strange, a shared reverie you never want to end. That's down to the fact that like much of the audience, the superb cast – mainly new but with some old faces (among them David Moorst as the anarchic sprite Puck) – are kept on their toes throughout. The space works like some hallucinogenic kaleidoscope; locations emerge through the floor and then, in the twinkling of an eye, submerge. Some of the actors are more like stunt-artists than others – Moorst bursting up through, and down into, a mattress, say, or sardonically delivering his lines upside down; the fairies flying and tumbling overhead on sheet ropes. But all must rise to the occasion of split-second timing. Wit and lyricism run in tandem with physical prowess. Whether it be an insightful emphasis or a giggle-making ad-lib – not a moment of the evening is slack. Hytner's canny re-framing of the action remains intact. Amid a pre-show display of devout ritual reminiscent of The Handmaid's Tale, we first see the captured Amazonian queen Hippolyta in a glass cabinet, like an exhibit (Susannah Fielding static, defiant and compelling). Her enforced impending marriage to her captor, Theseus, makes her sympathetic towards young Hermia (Nina Cassells), overruled in love by her father – and it's as if she casts a corrective spell over the court. Theseus becomes Oberon as he tosses and turns at night (Bunny Christie's design maximising the use of beds as woody dens and play-pens). Thereafter, as Hippolyta becomes Titania, queen of the fairies, she acquires vengeful agency in a flip of the usual scenario; it's Oberon (not she) who falls, nectar-tainted, for the ass-translated Bottom. The genius of this device is that it turns a planned humiliation into a 'queer' celebration, Emmanuel Akwafo's gloriously funny Bottom and JJ Feild's rippling Oberon are camply trundled round the auditorium in their boudoir to the pumping strains of Beyoncé's Love on Top. At the same time, the play's core question about who we desire, and why, and how that shapes us – is brought exhilaratingly to the fore, in all its complexity and confusion. There's much more, ravingly, to say but let's stick with this: perfect.
The Guardian
5 days ago
- Entertainment
- The Guardian
A Midsummer Night's Dream review – Nicholas Hytner's revels return with bawdy, uninhibited mischief
Shenanigans reign in this neck of the woods. Boogying back to the Bridge after six years, Nicholas Hytner's rollicking production of Shakespeare's great comedy feasts on bawdy mischief and aerial antics. Radiating charisma, Emmanuel Akwafo's uninhibited Bottom instructs his ragtag group of am-dram players to rehearse 'most obscenely and courageously'. Hytner's production, with somewhat more rigour and expertise, takes note. Bunny Christie's luscious set of beds, leaves and trapdoors has us at once rising from the murky depths of the forest and floating among the clouds of sleep. Half the audience mill amid the foggy underland, skilfully shuffled by stage management, while the rest of us sit up among the fairies. The immersive setup complements the play's shapeshifting unreality; in this world, we become another set of magical creatures lurking in the shadows. Rules of gravity are forgotten here. Led by David Moorst's spiky, spidery Puck, who reclaims his role from the original production, the disco-ready fairies barely touch the ground, gambolling instead across bedframes and dangling effortlessly from loops of aerial silks. Their astonishing acrobatics have echoes of the 1970 Peter Brook production of this play, albeit with more brazenly bisexual energy, which sweeps over the show like confetti. In the lovers' clamorous scene of misunderstandings, Puck amuses himself by floating above them, swivelling the direction of their affections like spinning tops. One of the production's greatest feats is switching the dialogue of fairy royalty Oberon (JJ Feild) and Titania (Susannah Fielding), which puts the power firmly in Titania's hands. With the two actors doubling up as Theseus and Hippolyta, their motivations and memories are folded into one another, so that Hippolyta's simmering rage at Theseus's entrapment of her feeds Titania's vengeful actions towards Oberon. The gender-flipping also gifts us Oberon's riotous seduction of Bottom, a scene so joyful the whole audience seems drunk on delight. The cast are comedy gold, their ad-libs winking to the crowd, though we could do without the distraction of the looser modern soundbites. Unlike in the 2019 run, the party doesn't carry on beyond the show, but the production itself is enough. When all the characters are awake and the evening's events seem distant, memories of what they did and who they kissed flicker through them. Even when dawn breaks, the night of giddy revels remains. At the Bridge theatre, London, until 20 August
The Guardian
6 days ago
- Entertainment
- The Guardian
Re-met by moonlight: A Midsummer Night's Dream returns to London's Bridge theatre
Hanging around during rehearsals for A Midsummer Night's Dream Photograph: Tristram Kenton/The Guardian Felicity Montagu, centre, plays Quince Emmanuel Akwafo (Bottom), David Moorst (Puck) and Dominic Semwanga (Flute) in rehearsals David Moorst with Susannah Fielding in the production, designed by Bunny Christie A Midsummer Night's Dream is an immersive production with some audience members up close and personal Emmanuel Akwafo, right, with JJ Feild, who doubles as Oberon and Theseus A Midsummer Night's Dream has movement direction by Arlene Phillips David Moorst (Puck), top, Divesh Subaskaran (Lysander) and Paul Adeyefa (Demetrius) There is co-direction and co-movement direction by James Cousins The costumes are designed by Christina Cunningham, with additional outfits by Bunny Christie Susannah Fielding and JJ Feild A Midsummer Night's Dream has lighting by Bruno Poet The composer is Grant Olding, with sound design by Paul Arditti Emmanuel Akwafo (Bottom) and Hilson Agbangbe (Starveling) in the production, with fight direction by Kate Waters The hair and make-up designer is Susanna Peretz A Midsummer Night's Dream is at the Bridge theatre, London, until 20 August
