Vice wins over virtue in crowd-pleasing saucy romp
MEASURE FOR MEASURE
Shakespeare’s Globe, SE1
MEASURE FOR MEASURE is usually regarded as one of Shakespeare’s darkest plays, a disturbing study of moral ambiguity, social decay and the corrupt antics of authority figures. But here Dominic Dromgoole interprets it as something close to a saucy romp. The play’s most louche characters, such as Petra Massey’s brothel-keeper Mistress Overdone, are more to the fore than usual — and across two and three quarter hours they revel in its innuendo.
Casually observing their clownish excess is Dominic Rowan’s engaging duke. He decides to slip away and allow Kurt Egyiawan’s stiff-necked Angelo to take charge of the city. Soon he returns in disguise (including a ludicrous attempt at a friar’s tonsure) to see what kind of job his deputy is doing.
Not a very good one, as it turns out. Angelo passes harsh judgement on Claudio, a young man who has got his fiancée pregnant. He also takes a shine to Claudio’s pious sister Isabella — played with dignity and resolute precision by Mariah Gale, who’s at her best in her key confrontation with an unexpectedly excitable Angelo.
Overall, the battle between vice and virtue feels lop-sided, as the production makes righteousness appear drab and sinfulness look a hoot. There’s also too vague a sense of setting — under the pretence of locating the play in Vienna, Shakespeare was able to depict the depravity of London, but here we get little idea of its edgy twilight atmosphere.
Still, it’s hard not to tune into the impudent joie-de-vivre, and there are spicy supporting performances from Trevor Fox as roguish barman Pompey and Brendan O’Hea as Claudio’s capricious friend Lucio.
This has been billed as Dromgoole’s final production as artistic director of Shakespeare’s Globe. In fact, though it’s his last outdoors, he’ll sign off by staging The Tempest at the Globe’s indoor Sam Wanamaker Playhouse early next year. But this crowdpleasing show is typical of his decade-long tenure — the hallmarks of which have been boisterous entertainment and a balance between gutsy risk-taking and commercially savvy populism.