As You Like It

by William Shakespeare

seen at Shakespeare's Globe on 30 May 2018

Federay Holmes and Elle While direct Jack Laskey as Rosalind, Bettrys Jones as Orlando, Nadia Nadarajah as Celia, Pearce Quigley as Jacques and Helen Schlesinger as both Duke Senior and Duke Frederick, with support from others in the company, in this new production paired with Hamlet (reviewed earlier this month). As in Hamlet the casting is 'gender-blind' with some very interesting and amusing results. In particular, though a number of male Rosalinds have been seen since Adrian Lester's beguiling performance in the 1990s, it is unusual to have a female Orlando. In fact, Jack Laskey himself took the part in the Globe's 2009 production opposite Naomi Frederick's Rosalind.

In many ways As You Like It proved more suitable to the directing methods proposed in these two productions. The collaborative exploration by the cast was evidently as important as the input of the directors themselves, and this led to a lack of incisive focus in the tragedy; here the effect is not so serious since the play itself is more genial and more tolerant of the exuberance of the results. There were many brilliant touches of  stage business, not least in the comic effect of having a very tall Rosalind and a diminutive Orlando (though on the other hand, credulity was severely strained in Orlando's wrestling match).

The contrast between the court and the Forest of Arden was adroitly handled, especially as there were no visual cues to the forest itself. The same cast members played courtiers and exiles (supporting Helen Schlesinger as both dukes) and changed from one to the other simply by reversing their cloaks in swaggering flourishes without even leaving the stage. This provoked delighted amusement in the audience while at the same time being utterly convincing. The sheer nastiness of Duke Frederick was also underscored here by his impatient treatment of his daughter Celia, here played in BSL by Nadia Nadarajah; her father could not even be bothered to communicate or read the sign language.

The rustic sub-plot was well handled in the person of James Garnon's drag act as Audrey, while the more important story of Rosalind's disguise as Ganymede was wonderfully presented by Jack Laskey's effervescent performance, gracious as a girl and lighting up the stage as a boy. The balancing presence of a more melancholy outlook in the person of Jacques, saddled with one of the most famous speeches of the Shakespeare canon (the 'seven ages of man' speech), was provided by the excellent Pearce Quigley in a part that seems almost to be written for his highly idiosyncratic approach - he began this speech with his mouth full of banana, and had to begin again with 'I was just saying ...'