THE HERBAL BED

THE HERBAL BED

English Touring Theatre at the Arts Theatre Cambridge
04.03.16


Peter Whelan's period piece was written 20 years ago for the RSC. It's the very Stratford-on-Avon story of Shakespeare's eldest daughter Susanna, married to respected local physician John Hall.
She is a frustrated, modern woman – unable, despite her skill and knowledge, to practise medicine, she helps as she can with herbal cordials. She is lonely, too, her husband often away for days at a time bringing healing to the well-to-do.
Amongst the speculation, the fact that a cheeky, feckless apprentice to her husband slanders her, is brought to trial in a church court and is excommunicated.
Whelan ingeniously imagines the lives behind the legal record; the tensions of post-Reformation society are credibly explored, the characters are strongly drawn. Emma Lowndes makes Susanna a flawed human being, neither saint nor sinner, but a woman torn between loyalty to her good husband and the excitement of adultery and the new science. Matt Whitchurch is excellent as the laddish accuser, and Michael Mears makes the most of the splendidly named Barnabus Goche, vicar general, somewhere between Obadiah Slope and the Witchfinder General, suavely sliding one sheet of evidence after another from his scrip. Charlotte Wakefield plays the faithful servant, almost a family member, reminiscent of Desdemona's Emilia.
Susanna's poet/playwright father, ailing round the corner in New Place, almost appears at the end, his nameless 'condition' a possible explanation of part of the slander. His little grand-daughter Elizabeth does appear, charmingly. She will inherit New Place in time, and die childless, the last of the Shakespeare line.
The touring set [Jonathan Fensom] is wonderfully realised, a dark timber cube, opening out to reveal the marvellous garden within, and gliding off to reveal the ecclesiastic courtroom, lit from behind by its high window, bereft of its stained glass by the “Purifiers”.

ETERNAL LOVE

ETERNAL LOVE

Shakespeare's Globe and ETT at the Arts Theatre Cambridge

06.02.14

Howard Brenton's 2006 In Extremis – a dazzlingly entertaining blend of poetry, dialectic, sex and laughs, is on the road this Spring, re-badged as Eternal Love, and touring as another joint venture between English Touring Theatre and Shakespeare's Globe.

The love in question is the legendary affair between Peter Abelard, theologian and composer, and Eloise d'Argenteuil, a rare twelfth century example of an educated young woman.

The original Globe production is faithfully invoked for this touring, proscenium version. As Brenton pointed out in conversation before the show, they are playing by Globe rules. So minimum lighting effects, a back wall with a ghost of Notre Dame just discernible and musicians' gallery, central curtained entrance with a doorway either side. And, in John Dove's production, that fluid Shakespearean scene segue that ensures a dynamic pace.

The energetic young company canter through the familiar tale of “France's favourite lovers”, with seduction hard on the heels of the first encounter, the altar as marriage bed leading straight to the farmers' gelding, and the tragic separation telescoped in the conclusion.

Jo Herbert is a wonderfully engaging Eloise, with her powder blue dress and her indomitable spirit – like Brenton's Anne Boleyn, she is a thoroughly modern young lady. David Sturzaker is her Abelard, an earnest philosopher, but a very human lover, too. Their passion over a copy of St Jerome is very touching.

Sam Crane is a credibly simple fanatic as Bernard, but not gaunt, ascetic or complex enough in his later, political life.

A fine supporting cast, including many familiar figures from the Globe company: William Mannering and John Cummins as a great comedy duo, Edward Peel as a down-to-earth Fulbert, broken by his niece's betrayal, and Julius D'Silva as a suave, substantial Louis VI.

Some superb costumes – the bishops' sumptuous robes – and William Lyons' brilliantly evocative music – those eloquent little bells – for the wedding night, say, or the medieval jig to finish, with a touch of magic the Globe could never emulate, twinkling coloured lights adorning the fingers of the players as they take their bows.

A fascinating play of ideas, books, and human frailty, Eternal Love is on the road nationwide until April.

Photograph of the Globe's 2007 production by Stephen Vaughan

ANNE BOLEYN

ANNE BOLEYN

Shakespeare's Globe tour at the Arts Theatre Cambridge

17.03.12

A huge touring company – fruitful collaboration between English Touring Theatre and Shakespeare's Globe – begins its travels at the Arts in Cambridge.

John Dove's première production of Howard Brenton's fascinating and intriguing piece survives very successfully the transfer to what must be one of the smallest stages of the tour. The Globe setting is evoked rather than replicated, with a single tree and a tiny musician's gallery.

One of the few scenes actually to benefit from the claustrophobic intimacy this allows was the moment when Anne is arrested, and is left alone amid an uncaring court.

Jo Herbert is a magnetic Anne, charming the audience, and her Henry, with her direct, flirtatious manner. Difficult to achieve the rapport with the house when darkness makes us invisible, but she succeeds, especially in her final farewell. Survivors from 2010 included Colin Hurley's woolly Wolsey, Michael Bertenshaw's solid Cecil, and James Garnon's amazing King James. And another chance to shudder at Julius d'Silva's Cromwell, career politician and ruthless schemer. A new Villiers in Michael Camp: an impressively honest performance, though the comic timing needs a few more previews to perfect.

It was good to chat with the players beforehand [another relic of the Globe original] – we learned that Lady Celia graduated from Fitzwilliam in 1997, and that "Steamy", though daunted by the old hands who arrived word perfect at the first rehearsal, was made welcome by a friendly company, and is hoping to see the show garner some five star reviews when it plays to the national critics in Brighton …