Shakespeare

Writer: William Shakespeare Director: Celeste Moratti Reviewer: Adrienne Sowers As a Shakespearean standard, Macbeth is one of the best-known plays in the English-speaking canon. Even watching the most avant-garde, esoteric interpretation of the play, the footholds of plot and character are so culturally prevalent that it is difficult to get lost, which makes First Maria Ensemble’s relatively straightforward presentation of ...

Writer: William Shakespeare Director: Fiona Laird Reviewer: Gus Mitchell The Merry Wives of Windsor is a definite odd duck in Shakespearian universe. Perhaps the least critically regarded and studied of all his works, the play on paper, is a pretty insubstantial romp through the backwaters of provincial Elizabethan England. Trading on the triumphantly charismatic figure of Sir John Falstaff from his ...

Artistic Director: Storme Toolis Director: Robin Norton Hale Reviewer: Maryam Philpott While Shakespeare’s plays can run to thousands of lines with a timeless understanding of the interior human world, the appearance of his characters is less defined. Yet think of any part and almost certainly an expectation of their age, physical shape and size comes to mind, especially for the ...

Writer: William Shakespeare  Director: Rufus Norris Reviewer: Charlotte Broadbent The National Theatre is taking its latest production of Macbeth around the country. The London run was met with mixed reviews and ran at a similar time to the Royal Shakespeare Company's production, which inevitably prompted comparisons. Rufus Norris's offering is undeniably unique and the entire design team has constructed a ...

Writer: William Shakespeare Director: Richard Twyman Reviewer: Anna Ambelez Othello is a plethora of impassioned emotions; hatred, fear, discrimination, jealousy, manipulation and prejudice, all the ingredients of a great night at the theatre? A Muslim General in a Christian country, Othello (Victor Oshin) marries Senator Brabantio’s (Christopher Bianchi) daughter Desdemona (Kitty Archer) secretly, leading to major repercussions. Othello promotes a ...

Writer: William Shakespeare Director: Erica Whyman Reviewer: Stephen Bates In an age of polarised views and deep social divisions, most of us will have little problem in relating to the premise that underpins William Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet. However, the divide that director Erica Whyman most strives to bridge in this Royal Shakespeare Company production, first seen in Stratford upon ...

Writer: William Shakespeare Director: Rufus Norris Reviewer: Lu Greer The National Theatre’s Macbeth, one of Shakespeare’s most popularly retold plays, tells the story of the aftermath of a ruinous civil war and the Macbeths being inexorably pulled towards the crown by forces of darkness. The tone of the show is evident immediately from the set which is dominated by an ...

Writer: William Shakespeare Director: Rufus Norris Reviewer: Dominic Corr Despite its notoriety as the pinnacle of the theatrical world, few can adapt the Bard's words well. We all know the tale, or at least we boast about knowing it. Macbeth is far from a straightforward production. A step to the left and it becomes dreary, dank and uninteresting. A tad ...