Oddsocks thankfully condones theatrical madness and organised lunacy.
During the summer it brought Macbeth into a nearby country house garden.
Hilarious wasn’t in it - I needed my inhaler. But that affectionate memory was by no means superseded by this muddled and (at least in parts) laboured winter tour of Shakespeare’s comedy.
The company work its socks off, but when the sight gags decrease and we get to the nitty gritty of 17th-century style and language, areas of incomprehension suddenly open up. While you split your sides as a grotesquely huge Falstaff (the hardworking Andrew McGillan) is pushed into a 1950s Bendix washer (the play is set in post-war Britain - thus the Bendix replaces the washing basket) it isn’t quite so funny when the characters are required to deliver the speeches as the Bard planned them. Some of this may be due to lapses in rigorous pronunciation.
The idea is that we are in a television studio making a live broadcast of The Merry Wives of Windsor with a garish all-purpose set and commercial interludes shown on the upstage monitor.
The commercials were indeed droll - often far more amusing than what we were seeing and hearing on stage.
Elli Mackenzie (Mrs Page/Mrs Quickly) puts a wonderful comic handle on the proceedings, aided and abetted by the excellent Paul O’Neill (Mister Ford/Master Slender) and Avita Jay’s cheerful Anne Page.
Nevertheless, it was difficult to stay mentally alert for what seemed a very long evening, chockablock though it was with manic set pieces.
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