With Ivanov due to open in a few days and casting beginning to trickle through for Madame de Sade I'm suprised that we haven't had more casting announced for Twelfth Night, after all there are SO MANY fantastic, leading roles in this production of which Jacobi's Malvolio is only one. If anyone knows anything on the ever controversial grapevine then give us a hint. Or, I thought it might be a nice idea if people wanted to speculate too.

You are right about there being so many good roles, but this cuts both ways. Trevor Nunn has said that it is now impossible to cast this play properly for the theatre because of the large number of relatively small parts which all require very good actors to make them work. (For that reason he made a film of the play, with truly dismal results, but at least he attracted star actors for each part). In this case Michael Grandage has shown that he can attract big names and his casting is normally excellent so let's see.

How true. Interesting, I'd never thought of that. It must be difficult convincing great actors (who no doubt all require BIG salaries) tp play Auguecheek (sp?), Maria, Antonio etc... Perhaps that's why the play is such a perennial favourite among our leading drama schools? Everyone gets a chance to shine? Still, I imagine, as you suggest that Grandage is attracting huge names (for supporting roles as much as 'stars') on the back of his name and, crucially, that of the almost infallible Donmar. Otherwise this would be a very expensive venture salary-wise indeed. Especially with such reasonable ticket prices. So we can live in hope.

Apart from those you mention two difficult parts to cast are Sir Toby (how to make a distinctly unlikeable man amusing) and worst of all Feste - always liable to be totally unfunny. I think the best I have seen was the Kenneth Branagh production in Hammersmith years ago - just to remind those who saw it .... a mid-winter setting and .....

Tim Barker Antonio/Sea Captain
Shaun Prendergast Fabian
Anton Lesser Feste
Richard Briers Malvolio
Abigail McKern Maria
Caroline Langrishe Olivia
Christopher Ravenscroft Orsino Duke of Illyria
Christopher Hoilis Sebastian/Curio
James Simmons Sir Andrew Ague cheek
James Saxon Sir Toby Belch
Julian Gartside Valentine
Frances Barber Viola
Bunnie Christie designer
Kenneth Branagh director

I'd like to *cue broken record* see some of the RSC Histories ensemble in it. Every last one of them has proven they can shine in whatever role is handed to them, they kick ass at Shakespeare, one of them's already in 'Ivanov', and I would just really really like to see them all continuing to perform and be wonderful.

I thought the individual acting in the Histories was patchy, although as an ensemble they were excellent. As a concession then David Warner as Aguecheek. I was going to say Richard Cordery as Sir Toby but I see he is going to be in in Waste at the Almedia.

That was a brilliant Twelfth Night, Jan; I saw it in the theatre. Anton Lesser was amazing and so was Richard Briars.

This is a good moment to big-up Filter's radical rethink/homage/shrinkwrap/jazz riff of Twelfth Night, coming to the Tricycle imminently. I saw it in Edinburgh last year and was knocked sideways by its hip, sexy, carefree, knickers and cardigans insouciance which - while utterly off the wall and giddily confusing - somehow got the fundamental spirit and wit of Shakespeare's play more than most straight versions I've seen. But be warned, if you're the kind of person who likes your plots signposted at every turn, read the synopsis first, because these guys are daring to do something very different.

Sounds like one to avoid.

Incidentally, on your own web site you style yourself as a "freelance theatre reviewer" - that always vaguely amuses me because that's what we all are here, isn't it ?

Talking of Twelfth Night has anybody seen Filter's at the Tricycle? It's had some fantastic reviews and sounds as though it has given a much needed kick of life into this most wonderful play. Michael Coveney of Whatsonstage claims it's one of the best Twelfth Night's he's ever seen! Blimey.

On the other hand ....

http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/theatre/show...viewId=23550571

Sounds like the Kneehigh "Cymbeline" - nominally "accessible" but actually aimed squarely at and supported by the white middle-class chattering classes. It is actually a very non-accesible approach - requiring your audience to know the play before they go.

The whole enterprise is a really just a very cliquey theatrical in-joke form of elitism that we have seen before from the likes of Katie Mitchell (The Idiot), Kneehigh, Nicholas Hytner (various recent NT productions) and the late Ken Campbell which appeals to a very limited demographic.

Oh dear Jan. Maybe you should go and see it. Or maybe not, maybe you should sit and wait for the over priced over subscibed WHITE MIDDLE CLASS audience that'll fill the Wyndhams ( come on Jan, West End audiences)?. Have you ever been to the Tricycle? A theatre whose audience is predominantly made up of the Local community. Also from what I can gather from the National critics this production gets to the heart of Shakespeare's play and isn't suffocated by the "cliquey theatrical in-joke form of elitism" that has been present in so many Shakespeare productions. It sounds creative, fun, melancholic and above all ACCESSIBLE to those who can't necessarily afford to go and see West End productions. Good luck to them I say.

Oh yes, I've been to the Tricycle. As the Estate Agents tend to call Kilburn "Hampstead borders" I would agree that the Guardian-reading audience there is "local" to some extent, but they don't look or speak anything like the people you see in the pubs near the theatre.

Oh well, lets hope The Donmar reach those "poor lost souls" who wander through the streets of Soho or frequent the pubs. After all they do do that really well in their Neal's Yard home. Jan go and see Filter's Twelfth Night you never know you might be surprised!

I saw Filter's Twelfth Night at the Tricycle last night and was blown away by how brilliant it was! Funny, charming, daring, yet always true to the original. Thank heavens someone is thinking outside the box and taking risks when tackling texts over 400 years old - we're not always interested in seeing museum-piece Shakespeare productions for god's sake, how dull they are! Go and see it, it's phenomenal. Ignore The Standard's review (as usual she's an idiot - leave This is London alone, right wing rubbish) and check out any of the other reviews that I've read.

Oh dear, the ultimate term of abuse "right wing" !

Pandering to the chattering classes with this type of production is hardly "taking risks".

Call me naive, but didn't Shakespeare originally write for the "chattering masses"? What, then, is so wrong about producing a play to appeal to the same group, four hundred years later?

Jan, You are the worst type of elitist theatre goer! Theatre is struggling because of people like you! I saw Filter's Twelfth Night last night and it was filled to the rafters with an old and young audience who were absolutely absorbed from the word "if". I think you're right maybe you should "miss" it because it would totally sail straight over your naive little head.

How can theatre be struggling with people like Jan? How silly to say that. He is a paying punter, thereby supporting the theatre. As are we all on this board.

[Don't get excited, Jan, I know you can defend yourself but I was infuriated by the 'people like you ' phrase. ]

Oh dear ! You see someone really hopeless in a part - a comedy role where he gets no laughts at all - and you think "well, at least I won't have to endure that again", and then blow me down if a few years later he doesn't get cast in exactly the same role ! (Guy Henry as Aguecheek). His performances are always so odd - he talks like a record running at half speed.

It is because he is tall and gangly. Aguecheek has to be like that and I suppose they are short of actors of that build...Actually Guy Henry does good 'serious'. Having said that, his Mr Collins on the telly's Lost in Austen was good 'comic'.

Are there day seats for 12th night?

He's not very different in real life...

He's utterly delightful in real life...and a fabulous actor in my book.

Guy Henry was Sir Andrew in 1996 for the RSC, but also made a very good Malvolio in the RSC production in 2001, directed by Lindey Posner where Sir Andrew was played by Christopher Good in that production. See RSC performance database

His Parolles in All's Well was his usual unfunny slow-record performance. Some actors get a reputation for being able to play comedy although in fact they are not very good at it - Desmond Barrit is another.

I will admit Jan, I will disagree with you on Des B, his Malvolio way back when was memorable for all the right reasons, and is still my seminal Twelth Night. Off to see the excellent Filter one tonight after seeing Dream again

Didn't see DB in that production - Edward Petherbridge had taken over from him by the time I saw it. He seems to get cast on the basis of "He's fat so he must be funny" - even in the brilliant Ian Judge "Comedy of Errors" where he doubled the Antipholus twins (and another actor doubled the Dromios) I didn't think he was very amusing in himself.

How can £10 a ticket (if it isn't already sold out) be aimed at the white middle classes?? Surely the point of the Donmar dropping the ticket prices is so that as many people can fill the theatre and enjoy what I am sure will be a fabulous production.

The whole season is a reduced price season, and when you compare this to paying £60 (if not more), to see GREASE(!!!)

I think Michael Grandage should be knighted.

I'll assume that it was a slip of the keyboard as it is not a fact but only an opinion.

I have to say in my opinion (much humbler than Jan's of course) Des Barritt was extraordinarily good in Comedy of Errors

In my opinion it is a fact.

I think it is funnier when the twins are not doubled. I worry so much that the one actor is going to have a heart attack with all that running about and remembering which one he is supposed to be.

Asserting that opinion is fact does not make it so; and merely playing with semantics doesn't alter the fact that a fact is a fact and not an opinion and that what you have provided is an opinion (and that's a fact!)

Playing with semantics ? Ha ha. Physician, heal thyself !

Shall we play along for a while - even though no-one else is interested ? You seem to have confused my use of the idiomatic phrase "in fact" with the noun "fact". Whilst the latter usage does conform to your definition I would contend that its use in the phrase "in fact" is far less narrowly defined and the phrase merely means "actually" or "really" or "indeed" - words with far more shades of meaning. I am supported in this opinion by the leading dictionaries, of course - why not scurry along and check ?

We have had this tedious argument before several times on this board - of course what people post is their own opinion, but it would be very boring if we had to put "In my opinion" at the start of every sentence. In that context it is hard to see what point you were trying to make, and your original comment seems about as relevant as the assorted internet pedants who complain about spelling and punctuation mitakes in posting's. Still, each to his own I suppose.

zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz...

Jan strikes again, what a surprise! Hobby horses come to mind. God help us Jan if we ever meet, then again it would be great fun tearing shreds out of you, as I am sure there are other board members who would happily help me to do so.

On a more gentle note, has anyone been fortunate to see the show yet?

Id like to see you try, TMG. Leave Jan alone, he/she makes me laugh. Just don't take him/her too seriously.

My apologies to Lynette, Theatremadgoer (and others)! Despite my posting warnings in the past against getting into spats with Jan it is so easy to get sucked into the whirlpool particularly when strident assertions are being bandied about as empirical truths. So no Jan - I don't want to "play" and add credibility to your tendency towrds manipulative behaviour.....

As to the real issue - no, sorry, haven't seen it yet but am looking forward to it Guy Henry and all

Well, you don't really mean "empirical" do you, but I know what you mean.

I am seeing this one next year. I wonder if Jacobi's sterling (if surprising) efforts on "In The Night Garden" will attract a new younger audience to Shakespeare ? Something we all want, of course.

What the hell is In the Night Garden? Or is that like asking who are the Beatles....

It's more akin to asking who the Teletubbies are. The woman who created the Teletubbies seems to have upped her dosage of crack, got Sir Derek involved, and what she's come up with is the genuinely charming 'In the Night Garden'. Which I actually really like, but it has the unfortunate downside of me expecting Sir Derek to finish everything he says with "isn't that a pip?". Oh well. XD

Indeed. Watch the first 5 minutes of the show and I defy you not to be charmed - then stay on for Sir Derek's crisp enunciation of the text and expert handling of names such as "Ninky Nonk" and "Pinky Ponk" and "Igglepiggle" - often he sings us a little song too in a pleasing light baritone.

Wave to the Wottingers !

Oh my god. I've accidentally slipped into a parallel universe.

It's a brilliant piece of programming; children totally dig it, it helps hammer home the concept that everyone needs to go to bed at the end of their daily routine, and it's sweet enough that parents don't mind watching it either. The music's totally catchy, and if you're the sort of person who likes to overanalyse things, there's a whole wealth of source material to work from!

My favourite character is Makka Pakka. I like to imagine he used to be the CEO of a major multinational corporation before his OCD destroyed him and his career, so he now works as one of those "clean yer windscreen, guv'nor?" fellas in the Night Garden (where his OCD occasionally takes control, causing him to wash the entire Ninky Nonk, but generally, he's never been happier). Whereas Upsy Daisy and Iggle Piggle are obviously the Hero and Leander of the Night Garden, Iggle Piggle crossing the waters every night to be with his beloved. He hasn't been dashed to pieces on the rocks yet, which is something of a relief. The Pinky Ponk has blatantly escaped from 'Yellow Submarine'. I have yet to work out what's going on with the Tombliboos, Wottingers, or HaaHoos, but I will be buying myself a HaaHoo-shaped cushion before the festive season is over. :3

MOVING ON...

Do you people actually have little children, or......

I'm feeling nostalgic for the teletubbies.

I still miss Little Ted from Playschool!

The former. If you watch it currently (Cbeebies, circa 6:20pm) you get Kenneth Branagh himself in person telling you a story afterwards, and very good he is too.

The latter. I work in a bookshop, it's important to know what the kids are into so as to maximise sales to present-buying parents.

Oh come off it! you both love it for the sake of loving it - stop trying to come up with excuses!