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Titus
Andronicus
Shakespeare's
Globe - Sam Wanamaker Playhouse. Spring 2023
The full cast opens the performance of Titus Andronicus at the Sam Wanamaker Playhouse with a comic song by George Heyworth and Liv Morris that might suggest you are in for a musical comedy even if its chorus line tells you that it is about 'men killing men, men killing women and men killing children.'
There are certainly lots of laughs in Jude Christian’s production of Shakespeare’s play. The songs always get a laugh, though whether it’s necessary to insert an amusing song about rabbits in a three hour show is questionable.
The all-female cast dressed in plain pyjama suits are generally faithful to the text and clear in its expression if occasionally tempted to get laughs.
Katy Stephens as Titus is measured and effective as a father grieving the violence against his family. The usual suggestions of madness are carefully controlled.
Despite hands being chopped off and multiple killings there is never any blood. The violence is simply represented by the cutting of candles.
The scene in which Titus’s two sons Quintus (Beau Holland) and Martius (Daneka Etchells) with sudden comic Irish accents are stuck in a hole with a dead body is hilarious even if the outcome is their execution.
It’s a watchable production though the inconsistent mood and apolitical trajectory of the action along with its lengthy running time won’t win it many friends. Indeed on press night there was a noticeable number of seats that were empty after the interval.
But then the singers claim that 'after the horror show
you’ll feel better about your terrible life.' Their final word at the end
of the show after telling us all the Romans are dead is a jubilant 'Good!'
Keith
McKenna
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Review - Titus Andronicus - Sam Wanamaker Playhouse 2023