It’d been 5 years since I last saw my favourite Shakespeare play live, and many years since I’d seen it done well. So I was more than excited to see Stratford’s current production, despite my whole-hearted belief that the company’s chosen leading man was at least 20 years too young (and a sprightly man to […]
Occasionally (and I mean very occasionally, sadly) I see a Shakespeare play that makes me deliriously happy. This was one of those plays; the first at Stratford since Des McAnuff’s glorious 2011 Twelfth Night. I got a little bored in Act 5 (Act 5 of Midsummer being one of my least favourite things ever) and […]
The Tempest is one of Shakespeare’s most difficult plays to stage. The action is fairly simple and the characters generally pretty accessible but there’s magic, a monster, a spirit, multiple apparitions and a big on-stage storm. A big budget, a brilliant directorial brain or, ideally, both is required to pull it off without things looking […]
I have a complicated task in this review: to try to defend a production of Hamlet in which I did not admire the performance choices of the eponymous character. It is a theater cliché (more like a truth universally acknowledged) that no production of Hamlet can stand without its protagonist. And yet, there were elements […]
My second day at the Toronto Fringe was a one-play affair (don’t judge, I had things to do). But here’s the FULL LIST of our festival reviews if one isn’t enough for you. Love’s Labour’s Lost (A-) I was nervous about this one. My love of Shakespeare Bash’d and their clear, thoughtful approach to […]
I just spent an hour and a half with Shakespeare Bash’d Artistic Director James Wallis and his wife/collaborator Julia Nish-Lapidus. The conversation sprawled- I asked them what fans of their previous Fringe hits The Taming of the Shrew and Much Ado About Nothing could expect from their upcoming Love’s Labour’s Lost; they sung the praises […]
Shakespeare’s As You Like It offers one of his most accessible comedies. Featuring one of the Bard’s best female characters, the play is a wonderful exploration of sexual and romantic liberation and education, as personified in the diverse relationships in this classic play. The Actors’ Shakespeare Project delights in this energetic production, featuring some impressive […]
Full disclosure: I am not a Tempest fan. One of Shakespeare’s last plays, The Tempest is heralded as a farewell to the stage, a commentary on art and life, and a post-colonial exploration (though this last lens may be a later addition to the play’s analyses). The American Repertory Theater, in association with The Smith […]