#Rethinking2020: Shakespeare in Performance — Part Two
As we close out both 2019 and the 2010s, each of our writers has chosen to present a retrospective of the last decade of Shakespeare. Other than looking back at the past ten years and forwards to the next ten, they’ve each chosen their own focus and format.
In this two-part review of a decade in Shakespeare, I will identify ten standout performances in the playwright’s work, both on stage and screen. This second part surveys five outstanding actors from 2016–19. You can read part one of my performance retrospective here.
Sope Dirisu as Coriolanus in Coriolanus at the Royal Shakespeare Theatre, Stratford-upon-Avon, directed by Angus Jackson (2017)
Angus Jackson’s Coriolanus was my highlight of the RSC’s Roman Tragedies-themed season during 2017. The play’s themes of political dissidence, mob mentality and fragile, egotistic leaders, coupled with the direct, uncompromising tone of late period Shakespeare has made it a favourite for directors during the past decade. It would have been easy to pick either Ralph Fiennes or Tom Hiddleston as the standout actors in the title role and, indeed, both excelled in the self-directed 2012 film and Josie Rourke’s 2014 production at the Donmar Warehouse. However, more striking than either was the remarkable RSC debut of Sope Dirisu. The actor is unlikely to be known to mainstream audiences beyond appearing in the first series of Channel 4 series Humans (2015–18) and his brief but memorable performance at the end of 2016’s Instagram-themed Black Mirror episode “Nosedive”, but his youthful vitality, ferocity and fragility onstage as Caius Martius Coriolanus will live long in my memory. Dirisu commanded the stage and not only had the physically imposing stature required to make a convincing master of military discipline, but balanced the blend of charming oration and petulant angst perfectly.
Andrew Scott as Hamlet in Hamlet at the Almeida Theatre, London, directed by Robert Icke (2017)
Just as David Tennant was born to play the part with his deft comic timing and wide-eyed histrionics, so the broiling rage and captivating intensity which had made so many fall in love with Andrew Scott on screen in Sherlock and Fleabag, made him a perfect match for Hamlet. What was truly remarkable about the actor’s performance in Shakespeare’s most coveted male role was his ability to speak with such expert naturalism and emotional engagement that Hamlet’s speeches which have been heard ad nauseam sounded as though they had never previously been spoken aloud. Personally, no actor before or since has achieved this with such stunning ease. I will forever remember Scott’s approach towards his dead father beyond the veil at the end of this production and, still more, his subtle, yet heartbreaking glance back to where his corpse lies. A remarkable performance from a remarkable actor.
Keane & Doyle in 2Elfth Night at Paradise in Augustines — The Snug, Edinburgh (2019)
I am allowing myself an exception to the ‘one actor per production’ rule for this particular entry. Always partial to Shakespearean reduction, it would be impossible — and inappropriate — to choose between one half of a comic double-act and, in their two-person, tour-de-force compression of Twelfth Night at the 2019 Edinburgh Fringe Festival, the American duo Alan Coyne and Adrian Deane (collectively known as Keane & Doyle) proved how much can be done with so little when adapting Shakespeare’s plays. 2Elfth Night was a jaw-dropping display of vaudevillian Shakespeare, with the two actors sharing nearly every part and assigning those in which three characters are required onstage for an extended period to members of the audience. There were also moments when the comedy was stripped away and Keane & Doyle delivered moments of unexpected pathos. The best productions of Shakespeare’s comedies are those which recognise the need to lean into those serious moments of shade amidst the raucous light and 2Elfth Night offered a perfect example of this.
Hammed Animashaun as Bottom in A Midsummer Night’s Dream at The Bridge Theatre, London, directed by Nicholas Hytner (2019)
Although Nicholas Hynter’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream was chock-full of dynamic and original takes on well-worn characters, from Oliver Chris’s fragile Oberon to David Moorst’s ferocious Puck, none were more memorable than Hammed Animashaun’s hilarious, nonchalant and impetuous Bottom. The young actor channeled all his comedic panache into a performance which delivered a true masterclass in making Shakespeare’s masterfully drawn backseat actor simultaneously adorable, sympathetic and infuriating. There are numerous individual highlights from which to choose but Animashaun’s performance in the Rude Mechanicals’ production of Pyramus and Thisbe must surely rank highly, from the best realisation of Pyramus’s ludicrously overlong death throws to his attempt to downplay the misfiring sounds of a malfunctioning prop. I have seldom seen an actor break the fourth wall with such ease, wit and charm and Animashaun must be commended for dominating a production with such an abundance of colourful characters.
The ten actors on this list reflect to some extent the widening spectrum of representation in Shakespearean performance and, notably in lead roles, over the last decade. This is something which can only hope will continue to grow during the next decade as suggested by the exciting casting of The Good Fight’s Cush Jumbo in the Young Vic’s forthcoming production of Hamlet. Ben noted in his retrospective on Shakespeare on film, the appetite for high-profile, celebrity casting does not seem to have diminished, with forthcoming projects announced involving Oscar-winners Al Pacino, Denzel Washington and Frances McDormand. Gemma also indicated in her article on the process of reclamation in Shakespearean performance during the 2010s that continuing popularity of the Branagh school of Bardolatrous interpretation is going nowhere and, therefore, it is fair to assume that we can anticipate further projects from these heavyweight directors and actors in the 2020s. How will they adapt to new audiences, methods of cultural consumption and prevailing trends in performance and technology? The King (2019) recently demonstrated that a streaming service such as Netflix is likely to lean on consumer demand to see prominent actors familiar from other properties in Shakespearean roles and connections between the playwright’s work and prevailing popular culture such as Game of Thrones.
It is likely to be a different story onstage with rising theatre costs and waning interest in celebrity Shakespeare casting, if the end of the 2010s are any indication. Which actors might be under discussion in 2030? Perhaps the conversation will have moved towards the development of motion-capture inspired performance, at which Mark Quartley’s Ariel in Gregory Doran’s 2016 production of The Tempest perhaps hinted. On the other hand, as film, television and video games become more sophisticated in their level of graphics and immersion, perhaps theatre is destined to move more defiantly to the traditions of physically-involving ‘rough theatre’ discussed by Peter Brook in The Empty Stage and represented on this list, to varying degrees, by the performances of Keane & Doyle and Animashaun. We can only hope that directors, producers and casting agents will make envelope-pushing choices based on expanding an audience’s understanding of who can play portray Shakespeare’s greatest roles and not on profit margins.
