"As Cleopatra, Miss Bankhead barged down the Nile -- and sank."
The play also fascinated me because of the sheer size of the role of Cleopatra. Remember that in Shakespeare's day that role would have been played by a boy. Was there a boy actor of uncommon ability and strength of character in the company when this play was written? Was there perhaps a girl disguised as a boy? (think of Geoffrey Trease's novel Cue For Treason). Was the role split between two or more boys? The way the play is written, too, requires Cleopatra to appear as a woman whose character is so diverse that she looks and sounds almost like she suffers from bipolar syndrome. This can easily descend into mere caricature if not handled with care.
So, to this production, directed on the Tom Patterson stage by Gary Griffin. Yanna McIntosh as Cleopatra simply owned the stage, from the moment she first appeared. She's an actor noted for both great subtlety and great power, as she's shown in other seasons. It was all there in this performance. She managed all the turn-on-a-dime mood shifts with the most sudden snaps from mood to mood, but kept the character completely believable and sympathetic while she flipped over from jollity and mirth to rage. Even in the long death scene, which could easily sag or drag, she sustained remarkable intensity without going over the top into melodrama or histrionics. It's a long play, but I still craved for more when it was over, and McIntosh's performance was the major reason.
As Antony, Geraint Wyn Davies delivered a workmanlike performance, but for me simply wasn't in the same league. If anything, I would have liked to reverse the casting with Octavius Caesar (see below). Wyn Davies is a little too addicted to "bluff and bluster" style, and it didn't work well through his scenes with Cleopatra, although it was well suited to his scenes with other Romans.
Octavius was played with suitable emphasis and inner strength by Ben Carlson, one of the most versatile of the current crop of strong leading actors at Stratford. His finest moment was the restrained, moving delivery of his eulogy over the dead body of the queen at the end. I'd love to see what the play would look like with him as Antony, simply because I've never yet seen him tackle a role that he couldn't play really well. Wyn Davies' characteristic style would, I think, have worked better for him in Octavius.
Tom McCamus was ideal for the anti-heroic, ironic Enobarbus (an invention of Shakespeare's, by the way, not a historic character like many of the cast). His voice and face were well-suited to the man who always lets the heroic air out of the balloon whenever the others get too pompous or elevated.
Around these four characters there swirls a large assortment of minor roles, all played with aplomb by various members of one of Canada's strongest, deepest acting companies. Out of them I would single out Cleopatra's two ladies-in-waiting, Iras (Jennifer Mogbock) and Charmian (Sophia Walker), excellently contrasted with each other and with the queen, and very moving in the death scene.
In the restricted space of the Tom Patterson Theatre's long, narrow stage, there's no room for major set pieces or giant rolling towers of scenery. Designer Charlotte Dean aptly evoked the ancient world with restrained touches: small piles of amphorae at the corners, and a few appropriate pieces of furniture whisked in and out as needed. Costumes were suitably eye-catching when necessary, but not over-the-top with luxurious overkill.
Director Gary Griffin made most effective use of the front and back exits from the stage by having a new scene come on and the dialogue begin at one end before the actors of the previous scene had finished exiting at the other end. Stage pictures were composed carefully, with an eye to the audience on all three sides of the stage, no small achievement on such a restricted platform.
In spite of my dissatisfaction with Antony, I think this is the one play of all I have seen at Stratford this year that I might choose to revisit. There are two reasons: one is to again revel in Yanna McIntosh's magnificent performance, and the other is to become better acquainted with the poetry of Shakespeare's text, always better heard aloud in a theatre than read in silence at home.
So, to this production, directed on the Tom Patterson stage by Gary Griffin. Yanna McIntosh as Cleopatra simply owned the stage, from the moment she first appeared. She's an actor noted for both great subtlety and great power, as she's shown in other seasons. It was all there in this performance. She managed all the turn-on-a-dime mood shifts with the most sudden snaps from mood to mood, but kept the character completely believable and sympathetic while she flipped over from jollity and mirth to rage. Even in the long death scene, which could easily sag or drag, she sustained remarkable intensity without going over the top into melodrama or histrionics. It's a long play, but I still craved for more when it was over, and McIntosh's performance was the major reason.
As Antony, Geraint Wyn Davies delivered a workmanlike performance, but for me simply wasn't in the same league. If anything, I would have liked to reverse the casting with Octavius Caesar (see below). Wyn Davies is a little too addicted to "bluff and bluster" style, and it didn't work well through his scenes with Cleopatra, although it was well suited to his scenes with other Romans.
Octavius was played with suitable emphasis and inner strength by Ben Carlson, one of the most versatile of the current crop of strong leading actors at Stratford. His finest moment was the restrained, moving delivery of his eulogy over the dead body of the queen at the end. I'd love to see what the play would look like with him as Antony, simply because I've never yet seen him tackle a role that he couldn't play really well. Wyn Davies' characteristic style would, I think, have worked better for him in Octavius.
Tom McCamus was ideal for the anti-heroic, ironic Enobarbus (an invention of Shakespeare's, by the way, not a historic character like many of the cast). His voice and face were well-suited to the man who always lets the heroic air out of the balloon whenever the others get too pompous or elevated.
Around these four characters there swirls a large assortment of minor roles, all played with aplomb by various members of one of Canada's strongest, deepest acting companies. Out of them I would single out Cleopatra's two ladies-in-waiting, Iras (Jennifer Mogbock) and Charmian (Sophia Walker), excellently contrasted with each other and with the queen, and very moving in the death scene.
In the restricted space of the Tom Patterson Theatre's long, narrow stage, there's no room for major set pieces or giant rolling towers of scenery. Designer Charlotte Dean aptly evoked the ancient world with restrained touches: small piles of amphorae at the corners, and a few appropriate pieces of furniture whisked in and out as needed. Costumes were suitably eye-catching when necessary, but not over-the-top with luxurious overkill.
Director Gary Griffin made most effective use of the front and back exits from the stage by having a new scene come on and the dialogue begin at one end before the actors of the previous scene had finished exiting at the other end. Stage pictures were composed carefully, with an eye to the audience on all three sides of the stage, no small achievement on such a restricted platform.
In spite of my dissatisfaction with Antony, I think this is the one play of all I have seen at Stratford this year that I might choose to revisit. There are two reasons: one is to again revel in Yanna McIntosh's magnificent performance, and the other is to become better acquainted with the poetry of Shakespeare's text, always better heard aloud in a theatre than read in silence at home.
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