A night of bawdy humour and slapstick theatre is guaranteed in the State Theatre Company of South Australia and Bell Shakespeare Company’s co-production of The Comedy of Errors.
The plot of Shakespeare’s early farce is simple; due to a maritime disaster, two sets of identical infant twins, comprising two young masters both called Antipholus and two young servants called Dromio, are separated from their twins and grow up in different towns. More than two decades later one master and servant team’s search for their brothers has resulted in both Antipholuses and both Dromios being in the same town at the same time and being mistaken for the other by the townsfolk and also, at times, by their own master and servant. If you can accept the plot anomaly that the visiting brothers never contemplate the possibility that they are being mistaken for the identical brothers they are searching for, then you are rewarded with entertaining mistaken-identity inspired farce.
Shakespeare’s play is set during the daylight hours but director Imara Savage has set her play at night, in and around the seedy underbelly of a large contemporary city. This grittier setting enables Savage to accentuate the crude, broad humour of the play.
Considering the farcical nature of the text, and that Shakespeare himself appropriated Roman dramatist Plautus’ plays Menaechmi and Amphitryon for the main plot elements and set pieces of The Comedy of Errors, a divergence from the original presentation of this work is certainly not unexpected or inappropriate.
Uproarious laughter is achieved through the clever and cheeky use of an oversized g-string, the sexual use of ping-pong balls, silhouetted simulated sex scenes, and most successfully with Jude Henshall as the comely Luciana astride an obviously pleasurable vibrating washing machine. Not all attempts at broad humour worked; an attempt to draw laughs early in the play simply through the comic representation of a same-sex coupling was disappointing – it is 2013, after all. The same can be said of cross-dressing prostitutes and the unnecessary speech-impediment inflicted on the Abbess (Suzannah McDonald). During an overly long nightclub montage a momentary laugh is gained through the act of collective projectile vomiting; however this small payoff does not outweigh the drawback of having the play’s denouement, sometime later, being played out amongst numerous pools of vegetable chunks.
Nathan O’Keefe and Septimus Caton are well cast as identical twins and deliver fine performances as Antipholus of Syracuse and Ephesus respectively; however it is the Dromio twins whose performances stand out. Renato Musolino, excellent as always, is cheeky and charming as the gormless Dromio of Syracuse and Hazem Shammas utilizes great comic skill and inflection in his portrayal of Dromio of Ephesus. Elena Carapetis (Adriana, wife of Antipholus of Ephesus) contemporizes Shakespeare’s text exquisitely in a superb performance.
The performances in the minor roles are less successful, though some poor choices may have contributed to this. Anthony Taufa’s portrayal of the Duke, the respected law-giver of the town, as Mafioso boss Don Corleone from cinema’s The Godfather was gimmicky and ill-conceived. Taufa played several roles and was wooden and unconvincing in all. Eugene Gilfedder’s Aegeon (the father of the Antipholus twins) seemed anachronistic; he wandered onto the stage seemingly straying from an entirely different performance of this play.
Pip Runciman’s simple set of a row of doors easily transforms the set from an immigration centre to a nightclub, seedy street, private residence and religious priory through the use of text and effective lighting (Mark Pennington). The pulsating incidental music by David Heinrich played during all scene changes complemented nightclub scenes but was jarringly out of place for other scenes.
This production of The Comedy of Errors, Shakespeare’s shortest play, is performed without an interval and is 100 minutes of energetic and entertaining theatre.
Rating: 3 ½ stars out of 5
The Comedy of Errors
By William Shakespeare
Director: Imara Savage
Designer: Pip Runciman
Lighting Designer: Mark Pennington
Physical Comedy Consultant: Scott Witt
Composer and Sound Designer: David Heinrich
Cast: Nathan O’Keefe, Septimus Caton, Renato Musolino, Hazem Shammas, Elena Carapetis, Jude Henshall, Eugene Gilfedder, Suzannah McDonald, Demetrio Sirilas and Anthony Taufa.
Dunstan Playhouse, Adelaide Festival Centre
28 June – 14 July
