Giving Shakespeare a fresh look
SOME of Shakespeare’s plays, tragedy and comedy alike, are problematic in view of a postenlightenment sensibility which reacts to such issues as anti-Semitism (The Merchant of Venice) or racism (Othello) differently from that of the Bard’s contemporaries. Among these is The Taming of the
Shrew, with its heavy-handed treatment of female subjugation, a feminist’s nightmare.
Tara Notcutt’s approach to this chauvinistic work is to defuse the tinder box of sexism by opting for an all-female cast and even a technical crew devoid of any male participation. Given that female roles were played in Shakespeare’s day by young boys, Notcutt’s single-gender production is not as bizarre as one might initially suppose. It does present some problems, since some of the performers are more convincing in masculine guise than others.
Petruchio’s mastery of Kate is in itself a ludicrous exercise, taking the woman from one extreme to the other. She goes from notorious termagant to spiritless doormat – and that is enough to strain credulity before any approach to staging has been decided upon. No doubt this is why one feels so little connection with the characters of
The Shrew; they come across as mere players in an outrageous battle of the sexes divorced from reality.
This perhaps also explains why Notcutt’s direction is not apparently targeting verisimilitude, with stage sets changed by cast-members in full view of the audience, and portrayals that in some cases border on the grotesque. Add to that costuming inspired by the 1990s and rap music, and this production morphs into something uniquely at odds with tradition.
This production boasts enough sterling performances to engage the audience. Both leads – McCormick as Kate and Van der Walt as Petruchio – are aggressively equal to the challenge of their roles; Crofford excels in a well-judged portrayal of Baptista, while Dianne Simpson’s twittery little Gremio is a gem. In secondary parts, Kate Pinchuck robustly upstages fellow actors as the clownish Hortensio, and Naledi Majola gives an articulate and intelligent reading of the servant Tranio. There is a tendency among the rest of the cast to rush delivery of their lines, to the detriment of Shakespeare’s opulent language.
Love it or hate it, this production of The Shrew is not one to be forgotten soon.