There’s great clarity to Tom Littler’s bittersweet 1940s staging of Shakespeare’s comedy of romance and misunderstanding. Every emotion and every intention comes across fully, and there’s both a lovely late-career performance from 85-year-old Oliver Ford Davies as Malvolio, and an impressively nuanced Viola from Patricia Allison.
The casting of older actors in lead roles – Ford Davies is joined by a roguish Clive Francis as Sir Toby Belch and a spry Jane Asher as Maria – arguably adds to a lugubriousness in the pacing. There’s also a melancholy, autumnal undertow to the humour.
Plaques commemorating those who have died in war line the walls, and a baby grand piano – expertly played by a dapper Stefan Bednarczyk as the fool Feste – sits centre stage atop a giant, burnished clockface. Twelfth Night is as much about the fleeting nature of time and human happiness as it is about the comic consequences of cross-dressing.
The men are in evening dress – Sir Toby’s medals suggesting service in an earlier war – and the women in stylish but solemn black gowns. Lady Olivia (Dorothea Myer-Bennett) is mourning her dead brother, while Duke Orsino (Tom Kanji) is sick and sad for hopeless love of her. Into their lives comes shipwrecked Viola, convinced her own brother is drowned, and disguising her own loss in male attire and a pert, open demeanour that both nobles find disconcertingly attractive.
The confusion that ensues when Viola’s lookalike brother reappears plays out alongside the subplot where the raucous members of Olivia’s household convince her puritan steward Malvolio that his mistress is in love with him. In their fourth pairing at this theatre, Francis and Asher slightly overplay their characters’ mischievousness.
Robert Mountford is OTT as the foolish Andrew Aguecheek and bears an unnervingly strong resemblance to Ed Milliband. But Ford Davies gives a masterclass in comic timing and delivery as the pompous, self-regarding major domo. When Malvolio mutters that the garters Olivia supposedly asked him to wear “make some obstruction in the blood”, you believe him.
Myer-Bennett convincingly suggests the ignition of lust in Olivia’s closed heart, doffing her veil to reveal her daringly backless gown, and later greeting Orsino half-dressed after some implied afternoon delight. But the production’s most poignant image comes when Orsino and the disguised Viola share a whiskey and a rueful conversation about love, their heads laid on the lid of the piano as Feste softly plays, their hands inching towards each other.
On the surface this looks like a staid, safe production with its veteran famous faces, swanky Downton attire and tinkling accompaniment. But the bold dominance of the piano, like a giant coffin, is symbolic of the subtle radicalism of Littler’s staging. The potent sense of mortality underlying this show makes the romance and the celebration of pleasure much richer.
Orange Tree Theatre, to Jan 25, orangetreetheatre.co.uk
