As You Like It at the Rose Theatre, Kingston
All the world’s a stage, and all the men and women merely players.
Stephen Unwin selected Shakespeare’s pastoral comedy as the eleventh production of the Rose Theatre. Rosalind, the daughter of a banished duke falls in love with Orlando, the disinherited son of one of the duke’s friends. When she is banished from the court by her usurping uncle, Duke Frederick, Rosalind takes on the appearance of a boy - Ganymede - and escapes with her cousin Celia and the jester Touchstone to the Forest of Arden, where her father and his friends live in exile like Robin Hood’s Merry Men.
Unwin’s production is fast-paced and exciting and his cast is extremely good. However, the star of the evening has to be Adrian Lukis. I have never heard a better delivery of the “Seven Ages of Men” speech. Lukis’s performance as the melancholy Jaques alone makes this production worth seeing. Georgina Rich’s Rosalind seemed rather subdued before she changed into Ganymede but the necklace scene is very funny and charming. David Sturzaker as the romantic hero presents a great fight in the wrestling scene and there undoubtably is a chemical reaction between him and Rosalind. Michael Feast, who so impressed me as Feste in Twelfth Night, is the fast talking jester Touchstone who falls for feisty Audrey (Claire Prempeh). Paul Shelley gives a fine performance as both Dukes.
The stage design byJonathan Fensom is comprised of a mound of earth and three boughs that are lowered during the performance. It seemed more suited to the forest scenes and somewhat inconvenient with the actors stumbling about the mound rather awkwardly at times. However, when the action moved to the Forest of Arden it became quite suitable and variable.
This production is thoroughly enjoyable.
Until 26 March 2010
See Tickets - 0871 230 1552
The Rose Theatre
24-26 High Street, Kingston
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