A Midsummer Night's Dream

by William Shakespeare

seen at Racks Close Guildford on 17 June 2022

Abigail Anderson directs A Midsummer Night's Dream, the first play this summer's season by the Guildford Shakespeare Company, performed in Racks Close, a hilly park in the centre of Guildford. A cast of nine take on the twenty speaking roles, though intriguingly Titania's four servants are never actually seen; only Rosaline Blessed has a single role as Nic Bottom. As is almost traditonal, Theseus and Oberon were twinned (Jim Creighton), matched by Hippolyta and Titania (Johanne Murdock).

The play began in the picnic area, which was perhaps a too difficult acoustic for some of the audience. However, once the Mechanicals had arrived, ostensibly from among the picnickers, and distributed their parts, the audience was invited to walk up to the proper acting area where seats were provided before an amphitheatre-like stage. Here it was much easier to follow the proceedings, and the setting was ideal for the night's events in the forest.

The opening scene was played 'straight', that is, with no hint that the suavity of Theseus's words to Hippolyta might be masking a fairly brutal marriage arrangement, and no hint from Hippolyta that she might find the Athenian laws affecting Hermia in any way distasteful or wrong. (The long recriminations between Oberon and Titania were also curtailed.) The travails of the four young people were thus related only to their own misaligned loves and Puck's mismanagement of the magic flower; creating a light-hearted entertainment on a balmy summer's night. The brutality of the courtiers' disparagement of the Mechanicals' play was considerably watered down by the fact that only Theseus, Hippolyta and Philostrate were witnessing it - the two pairs of lovers were busy being various Mechanicals, and the members of the court were seated among the real audience with many of their harshest comments cut. Again, the effect was to lighten the mood, without detrcting from the ridiculousness of the Pyramus and Thisbe play: as should be expected Bottom provided a spectacularly over-the-top death scene.

Robin Goodfellow (Daniel Krikler) was an engaging Puck, at one point riding a unicycle, and appearing on stilts at the beginning of the second half. He was far too cheerful to be downcast by his mistakes or Oberon's displeasure, and thought nothing of scaling the tree in the centre of the stage to watch the foolish mortals from above. The sound design by Matt Eaton augmented his magical side by throwing his voice around through cunningly placed speakers, and this feature was also put to excellent use in directing the audience's attenton to the invisible Cobweb, Moth, Mustardseed and Peaseblossom.

All in all, a delightful way to enjoy an outdoor version of the play.