The Taming of the Shrew – Royal Shakespeare Theatre

1590s. England is a matriarchy. These five words sum up fantastically how director Justin Audibert turned this problematic play by Shakespeare on its head, with great results.

As suggested by making England a matriarchy, the genders in this RSC production of The Taming of the Shrew were all swapped, so Baptista Minola, a gentlewoman, wants to marry her sons to the highest bidder, but insists that her younger son, Bianco, may not marry before his older brother, Katherine, the eponymous shrew. Petruchia, a friend of one of Bianco’s many suitors, vows to woo Katherine for his dowry and for the challenge of overcoming his fearsome reputation.

There were many standout performances in this production. Claire Price was a feisty Petruchia who still managed to be likeable despite her cruelty towards Katherine. There was plenty of humour amongst Bianco’s suitors, particularly Sophie Stanton as Gremia gliding across the stage. I also enjoyed James Cooney’s hair flicking and flirtation as Bianco.

The costumes, designed by Hannah Clark, were beautiful. I particularly liked the costumes that combined traditional ‘male’ and ‘female’ costumes from the 16th century, such as Petruchia and Katherine’s wedding outfits

It is still a troublesome play – the cruelty was still evident even when it was a woman abusing a man. However, I think gender swapping is the only way the play can ‘work’ successfully in modern times. Some of the line changes created a lot of humour, such as

I am ashamed that men are so simple

while others, such as

Why are our bodies soft and weak and smooth

didn’t always work. I also felt that Joseph Arkley as Katherine was a fairly timid shrew. Apart from one instance of trying to cut off Bianco’s hair, it didn’t seem that a lot of taming was required. Nevertheless, these are minor quibbles. This was a fantastic production and not to be missed on tour or at the Barbican.

Measure for Measure – RSC Live

The Duke of Vienna decides to leave, and chooses Angelo as his deputy to run the city in his absence. Angelo decides to clamp down on the loose morality of the city, including closing the brothels and sentencing a young man named Claudio to death, because he has got the girl who intends to marry pregnant. Claudio’s friend, Lucio, visits Claudio’s sister, Isabella, a novice nun, and she decides to try and persuade Angelo to change his mind. He tells her that he’ll let Claudio free in exchange for sex.

There are so many themes in this play which resonate with our lives today, including corrupt power, hypocrisy and the Me Too movement. It was quite shocking to hear Claudio utter ‘Who will believe thee?’ to Isabella when she says that she will tell people of his offer. It’s incredible that a line from a 400 year old play can still be so poignant today.

Although there are plenty of relatable themes, it is the ending which makes this play problematic. After the Duke’s return and his exposure of Claudio’r hypocrisy, Claudio is forgiven by his wife and the Duke announces that he will marry Isabella. She says nothing. It was interesting that during the feature shown during the interval about previous productions, it was mentioned that when Juliet Stevenson played Isabella, she tried to find moments in the play where a potential romance between Isabella and the Duke could be hinted, which would give the play a happier ending. In this production however, Isabella was simply passed from being the subject of one man’s power to another.

As always with the RSC, this was a high value production and the story was told incredibly clearly. Antony Byrne was charismatic as the Duke and Lucy Phelps was moving as Isabella. I also particularly liked Joseph Arkley as Lucio, who brought some light hearted moments to the play.

I knew nothing of this play beforehand and I’m glad that I got to see such a fantastic production through RSC Live.