Attending a Royal Shakespeare Company production of a well-known and much-loved Shakespeare classic (I guess they’re all classics!) is an adventure into the imagination. Which setting will the fevered brain of a gifted director (in this case Michael Longhurst) have chosen to take us away from its traditional location? In this production, the house of Leonato, the Governor of Messina, and a visit from the Prince of Aragon, Don Pedro, still takes place in Messina – but at the final of the European Cup, where Messina FC have smashed those upstarts from Madrid FC, and tasted footie glory. Leonato owns the club, Don Pedro is the manager, Benedick is their captain and Claudio their new star player. The re-allocation of roles doesn’t end there; Beatrice is a sports reporter, Margaret works in PR for Leonato’s company and even Dogberry is head of security at the stadium.
When you enter the auditorium, it’s like you’ve mistakenly gone to see Dear England instead – all LED banners with football scores, team lists, formation diagrams, etc. We’re just inside the tunnel and can see through the gap into the huge, excited crowd and the green grass of the pitch. Interview cameras and screens are all set up. And, whilst, on the face of it, this has nothing to do with Much Ado About Nothing, visually, it’s a feast and really makes you excited for what’s about to happen next.
Unfortunately, what happens next is a very confusing, messy, noisy scene where the victorious players take to the stage, managers, staff and players all congratulate and tease each other, and players jump in the bath. You also realise that the words you are hearing – those that you can make out at least, because the speech is very garbled in this opening scene – are not that faithful to those of the beloved Bard. I don’t recall, for example, chants of He’s gone in the bath, he’s gone in the bath in the original. It quickly becomes clear that these early scenes are merely a serving suggestion of the Much Ado we know and love and that some huge liberties have been taken with the text. It’s at moments like this that one discovers one’s own purist level – and mine was certainly crossed.
However, as the production progresses, it becomes clear that the football analogy doesn’t really work, and the links between the plot and the Beautiful Game become fewer and slighter, so that, by the end, it feels like a relatively straightforward modern day interpretation of the play, with some very effective use of social media and modern tech. Don John’s deception of Claudio into believing that Hero has been unfaithful before their marriage is shown like a cross between deepfake and a revenge porn attack, with Hero’s face being digitally manipulated onto Margaret’s body whilst she’s filmed in flagrante delicto on Hero’s bed. The simplicity of the deception is surprisingly disturbing; and of course the social media comments depict Twitter/X at its most vicious.
Elsewhere, the famous scenes where Benedick and Beatrice separately overhear others talking about how much they are mutually desired work well. Benedick, who has been having a sports massage, hides himself in and around the portable massage bed. Beatrice hides herself behind a desk which had previously been used as a DJ mixing deck, with the result that she accidentally knocks a button which turns the disco lights on to the sound of I’m horny, horny, horny, horny. Ah yes; I hadn’t mentioned the use of music yet. There’s a lot of it. And it’s a mixture of pop classics and techno thump – and to be fair, it’s very entertaining and fits well. Who knew that the drunken Leonato would end the masked ball crooning Frank Sinatra’s My Way.
Jon Bausor’s set is nothing if not arresting; the pool in the middle of the stage acts as the bath in the footballers’ changing room, as well as the centrepiece of Leonato’s garden – although a laborious entry by two backstage technicians adding a fountain to it during a scene is clumsy and distracting and adds very little to the effect. Upstairs opens to reveal Hero’s bedroom, although the angle from the stalls doesn’t always make it clear what’s happening up there. However, the football and social media imagery work extremely well thanks to Tal Rosner’s excellent video design.
As you would expect, there are some very good performances, although I was never convinced that Nick Blood’s otherwise very relatable Benedick was ever truly against marriage; with his successful football career taking up all his time, he just hadn’t needed it yet. But he brings out the humour from the text beautifully, both the original and the new elements; and participates in a very funny act of physical comedy when his massage towel is swiped away and plunges himself in the pool to protect his modesty – excellent ball control there. Freema Agyeman takes the cut-throat life of Beatrice the TV reporter into the character’s private life with her brutal, professional dismissiveness of Benedick, and delights in thwarting him with as little fuss as possible; her surprise instruction Kill Claudio is delivered as though it were next on her to do list, and his instant refusal just blanks him out of her life (temporarily, of course).
Daniel Adeosun is very good as Claudio, highly believable as the sporting hero and easily duped fiancé; Eleanor Worthington-Cox’s Hero is more of a fun-lover than she is normally portrayed, Olivier Huband is a charismatic Don Pedro, and Jay Taylor is excellent as the wretched Borachio, doing Don John’s dirty work. There’s a gasp-inducing moment of stage combat when, infuriated by what Borachio has done, Mr Huband just head butts Mr Taylor, and it’s extremely effective! The portrayal of Dogberry and his team can often come across as dated and laborious in this play – a bit like the Porter in Macbeth it can either be astounding or cringeworthy – and I’m afraid the characterisations in this production didn’t really work for me. But there’s also excellent support from Nojan Khazai as the devious Don John, Gina Bramhill as Margaret and Tanya Franks as Antonia, Leonato’s wife.
Once the whole football theme starts to fade away, then the excellence of Shakespeare’s play starts to take shape; so despite the quality of the production and performances, for me this is only a partly successful show. But there is a lot to enjoy – just take a chill pill if you’re a purist!
Production photos by Marc Brenner
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