REVIEW: As You Like It, Botanical Gardens
HEY man what's with the Shakespeare? How come there's Bob Dylan and The Animals blasting out from loudspeakers and hippies with banners proclaiming "love", "peace" and "ban the bomb?" Is there a love-in going on in the Botanical Gardens?
Relax and enjoy: Heartbreak Productions are back again with a wonderfully innovative take on As You Like It.
It seems director Peter Mimmack reckons the piece is about oppression and freedom. He thinks it feels so Sixties with Duke Ferdinand's court all conformity and so heavy and the Forest of Arden all freedom and love. It's a take on the play that works to great effect and engages throughout.
There's gifted playing from a cast of only five actors. Helen Rynne (Rosalind/Audrey) and Alice Brockway (Celia/Phebe ) are strong on the sisterly love between Rosalind and Celia; they can also do lewd and bawdy as Audrey and Phebe. Dan Mcgarry is outstanding, playing both the lovely Orlando and his not-so-lovely brother, Oliver, and Touchstone too. He even manages to make the jester role halfway funny.
Michael Sabbaton also displays great versatility as the villainous Duke Ferdinand, the laidback hippy Duke Senior, Coriin Adam and (don't ask) a born-again preacher. Joe Herzfeld is bruisingly good as the "bone-breaker" wrestler and is suitably lovelorn as Silvius. He is truly memorable as the melancholy Jacques and can sing too.
Its simple, but most effective and fluently staged design (Ellan Parry) is apt and imaginative. Great stuff.
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Friday 25 May 2012
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