The Merry Wives of Windsor (RSC 2018)

I caught it last night on the cinema screening. The "Merry Wives" (Beth Cordingly and Rebecca Lacey) themselves were brilliant, and I loved all of their pretended bad, stilted delivery of the lines during the practical jokes on Falstaff.

David Troughton must be losing pounds every night in the fat suit. He said in the pre-show filmed interview that he needed 3 dressers for all the costume changes. The comb-over wig and make up made him grotesque, but very funny.

I also liked the mashup of modern and Elizabethan instruments in the music. Loved the "romantic" fanfare that was played every time Luke Newberry entered as Fenton.

Shout out to the props guys also. The inside of that wheelie bin lid looked disgusting, never mind the rest of it!

Sounds great, NeilVHughes, and I want to see both.  But hoping, and holding out for a matinee and with a deal; presumably you saw an evening performance?  It sounds a bit long for me to stay awake then!

showgirl

Merry Wives was an evening performance, 2hrs 45min including interval, starts at 7:15 and therefore finishes at 10:00, staying awake unlikely to be an issue, chances are you will be woken by the laughter if not laughing yourself.

Nicholas Craig commented that if comedy is a serious business then farce is absolutely tragic. A view amply confirmed by this turkey which has arrived at the Barbican just in time for Christmas. The play is thin and needs heavy direction and the director here has at least had a good idea about updating it but has failed in the execution. It's just not funny. Not only my view but that of the majority of the audience who sat in stony silence for the first hour with only a smattering of laughter at the frantic mugging that was being offered up for our entertainment. The only big laugh was for a Brexit reference. After that it warmed up a bit with 3-4 people in my row laughing more consistently. I was staggered to see that a physical comedy director had been employed because it was so amateurishly done -for example Fenton repeatedly falling over didn't raise a laugh once.

If they were aiming at a younger audience than me (very likely) then their failure was even greater - a group of youngsters in front of me, and a family with children, all left at the interval and I couldn't blame them - doubtful they'll be back for an RSC show.

I quite like David Troughton but here he demonstrates he has no aptitude for comedy at all - an unsympathetic portentous actorly performance with no rapport with the audience at all, basically the same performance he gave us with Titus Andronicus where it was at least more appropriate.

The usual boring set, a victim as ever of the RST thrust stage transfer to the Barbican.

And finally, there was something just a little bit mean spirited about the production - a middle-class theatre company inviting us to be amused by their social inferiors, inviting us to laugh AT people rather than with them - Two workers who have to take the rubbish out ? Let's make then Polish - everyone will laugh at that. 

I see several reviews that say "the purists won't like this" - if by "purists" they mean people who think comedies should be funny then include me in. 

That is the tiredest of tired tropes, as recently written about by Natasha Tripney in the Stage. www.thestage.co.uk/opinion/2018/natasha-tripney-theatre-stop-stereotyping-eastern-europeans/

There weren't any surtitles. 

Same production but no surtitles at the Barbican when I saw it. Maybe others who have seen it at the Barbican can comment.

Should have made clear, i saw it in Stratford.

A mistake if they didn’t get the surtitles going in the Barbican. What woz they thinking of? To quote Sur Alan.

Possibly not visible from the front of the stalls - I've been warned about no view of surtitles for foreign language productions for the front row.

Trying to remember last RSC show i saw there. Think it was 2001 Comedy of Errors with David Tennant!!! Went a lot in the late 80s and 90s when i lived in London.

Oh well, i loved it in SUA along with the full house that day.

Thank god your funny bone works. After the half empty comments above, I was beginning to think i had dreamt lmao in Stratford!