Canterbury Tales - Tales 1

Synopsis

Canterbury Tales is a bawdy classic written 700 years ago, it centres on a group of pilgrims who entertain one another with stories as they ride to Canterbury Cathedral. But despite the apparently holy purpose of their journey these travellers reveal themselves as sinners rather than saints. The pilgrims contrasting and colourful backgrounds offer many different stories, from the serious and moral to the farcical and bawdy, proving that like Shakespeare after him, Chaucer was ‘not for an age but for all time .

Our Review:

14 July 2006

Unlike their fictional forebears in Chaucer, the band of pilgrims in the Royal Shakespeare Company’s adaptation of The Canterbury Tales does finally arrive at its destination. Though what happened to the competition to reward the best story remains anyone’s guess.

Mike Poulton’s six-hour saga, performed in two plays and thereby blocking out a summer’s day and night for all resilient epic fanciers, does not add any real dramatic value to the Chaucerian feast of language, bawdy, song and festival.

Once again, London theatregoers can only glean the vaguest idea of what characterises the RSC these days, as the West End presentation by Bill Kenwright and Thelma Holt - clearly does not reflect the sense of inclusive joy and high sprits that tumbled through the Swan (according to the reviews) in Stratford-upon-Avon at the end of last year. After a long tour, the show sits modestly, and not all that compellingly, in the stern proscenium of the Gielgud. <...

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Latest User Review

207.126.221.65) - 27 September 2006:

When it was good it was very ,very good and when it was bad it was still the RSC and better than the average. I saw part one And the funny tales worked better than the more serious ones -since more of the tales were funny this proved to be fortunate. And The staging was clever and fast paced...

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