A Midsummer Night's Dream

Synopsis

On a midsummer's night Hermia and her lover Lysander flee from Athens and Demetrius - the man Hermia's father favours as a son-in-law. Demetrius follows, pursued by Helena who loves him in spite of being spurned in favour of Hermia. On the same night Bottom and his friends leave Athens to find somewhere quiet to rehearse their play which is to be performed at the wedding feast of Duke Theseus. Drawn into the woods they enter a world of magic, mystery and wonder.

Our Review:

13 November 2008

Travelling company Footsbarn, now based in France, have brought their big-top back to London for the first time in over 15 years. And at a time when the regional rep system has all but disappeared, to witness an ensemble that have worked together in such close proximity for such a long time is a rare treat.

They tackle A Midsummer Night's Dream with the energy of schoolchildren playing with a dressing-up box, throwing ideas around with mixed fortunes. A buck-toothed, pantomimic Bottom is a delight (even if his constant tendency to abandon the text in order to crack contemporary gags wears a little thin), whereas a mask-adorned, skittish Puck who sounds much like a Monty Python knight with a steady barrage of “Ni’s” is not.

But it strikes me that to pick faults in the line delivery (which, due to the melange of international accents, is often indecipherable) is rather pointless, much like trying to critique the Teletubbies. God kn...

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Latest User Review

Chris Bearne - 8 November 2008:

Footsbarn's Dream has already made its impact and the fulsome reviews written when the troupe pitched their tent at Edinburgh this year, but now they're in London, all this month, their first season in the capital in twenty years, and they are not to be missed. Anyone who caught their Shakespeare Party at the Globe in the spring will need no persuading. For the rest, the jaunt to Victoria Park is more than worth the taking. The show is spectacular, colourful, funny and bewitching. It's beyond language yet Shakespeare is not short-changed. It's poetic and touching, yet clowning and circus skills are gloriously appropriate. It's glamorous yet sublimely tatty. It's roots are earthily mediaeval, yet it's absolutely of now and joyously international. Go. Experience. Relish....

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