Richard III

Shakespeare’s Globe, 21/05/24

Credit: Marc Brenner

Final rating: ★ ★ ★ ☆ ☆

On a revolting rainy night in London, I found myself sat at the Globe enjoying the opening monologue of Richard III even more than usual:

Now is the winter of our discontent

Made glorious summer by this sun…

I think not… but it was fun to see Michelle Terry as Richard also laugh with the audience at this moment. And that set the tone for her portrayal of Richard all the way through – it wasn’t about appearing the evil villain, but more about bringing the audience in to the deception of the character.

Obviously – there is a LOT of death in this play. Some of it upsetting, some of it quite intriguing as we find ourselves rooting for Richard as he murders his way to the top of the throne. The ensemble would throw bodies into the pit on stage – which had a cool effect that they were going to be incinerated. It seemed like a choice though to have somewhat jovial jazzy music playing over the top of their deaths – trying to convey not fear or evil but something else, I’m not quite sure what and still can’t decide if I like the idea. One death that will stay with me though is the murder of the two children – Young Richard and Young Edward – who are ordered to die by our soon-to-be-king. They are zipped inside a sleeping bag and we see their bodies gradually get progressively lifeless. The whole effect was done really well.

There were some dance routines which were also done well – but again I had to think to myself, is this Richard III? Kibong Tanji as Clarence was particularly good – who utilised a blood bag to nice effect at the point of her murder. Others were… not so great – and one performance in particular really let the entire production down for me. Sam Crerar played Catesby for the majority of the play – but it was done in such an annoying way, as a servant with a high degree of arrogance about him. It didn’t work for me, and then after he was murdered he returned to play Richmond who is hugely significant in the ending for overthrowing Richard III. But I really found it hard to watch and consequently I felt the ending really fell flat. That said, Helen Schlesinger’s Buckingham deserves a shout out for being relatable and enjoyable – with a few anachronistic ad-libs giving the character some added zeal.

The final dance was probably more symbolic of the fact that Shakespeare’s plays usually ended with some sort of pomp than significant to anything we’d just watched on stage. And there were two actors reading in roles due to the indisposition of some of the cast and they did it fantastically. It was just a bit of a confused take on the play for me – although the cuts to the script itself were good. And of course I haven’t even mentioned the ‘cultural war’ sparked by the globe by deciding to cast Michelle Terry as the lead and take out any reference to the character’s deformity. Personally, she gave a great performance and deserves credit for it – I just wish the cast around her had stepped it up a bit.