Writer and Director: Ben Humphrey
The York International Shakespeare Festival runs under the aegis of York St John University for some ten days to May 1, with a whole variety of projects available, from a sonnet marathon to performances of European plays, from staging Shakespeare’s plays to an introduction to Shakespeare’s Croatian contemporary, Marin Drzic.
For Shakespeare’s Fool the Festival moves to Theatre@41, an upstairs venue with a wide-open stage area. This is very much a Fringe production, with two years at Edinburgh behind it, a 75-minute running time without interval, a single actor and no set. It’s none the worse for the absence of set, a few scattered props being plenty for Robin Leetham in his expansive performance.
Will Kempe was Shakespeare’s slightly older contemporary, a jester and dancer who became one of the stars of the Lord Chamberlain’s Men in the 1590s. Although a “sharer” in the company, he left suddenly and for his last few years (his putative death date is 1603) he seems to have been striving to renew his fame, notably in the Nine Days’ Wonder of his dance to Norwich. The gaps and half-hints in his story have always inspired speculation and Humphrey invents a back story of Kempe being transfixed by master-jester Richard Tarlton on the Queen’s progress to Kenilworth Castle and thereupon, at 12 years old, joining Lord Leicester’s company. Why not? He was certainly a member of the company years after and even accompanied his Lordship to Europe, joining the company at Elsinore – now surely he must have had a word with Shakespeare about that?
The main drift of the play, though, is Kempe’s relationship with Shakespeare. He acts out two opposite views of the actor’s role: to amuse the audience and to preserve the integrity of the play. It’s difficult to argue against Humphrey’s interpretation of events: Kempe invented sunny jester-like characters (Dogberry, for instance), Shakespeare objected to his playing around with the lines, Kempe was sacked, Shakespeare’s revenge included Hamlet’s advice to the players in the next play at the Globe and – unmentioned in the play, as how could Kempe know? – from then on Shakespeare’s fools tended to be more adult and cynical.
Robin Leetham as Kempe gives his final performance to a wounded mouse and his marrote, that stick with a jester’s head on it, with whom he indulges in increasingly irritated dialogue. Humphrey makes no attempt at authentic Elizabethan speech, save in quotations, and the contemporary asides work neatly. Leetham is adept at rapid-fire delivery (notably in an extended scene for one of the Dromios and his master – the marrote, of course), but gradually subsides towards death, “Rebecca” being his last word, the memory of a long-ago infatuation.
Reviewed on 25 April 2023.
