After a lacklustre performance as Othello for the Royal Shakespeare Company, John Douglas Thomson could be forgiven for finding a less well-known play to go away and hide in. The fact that he has returned to The Merchant of Venice to play Shylock suggests that this Shakespearean actor has more to him than the fear of failure.
However, one of the greatest things about this version of The Merchant of Venice is that it is not a vehicle for any one individual, but it happens to be a vehicle for attempting to address the problem at its very own heart.
It manages to do that by reducing Shylock from a villain into an ordinary human being.
The anti-Semitic nature of the exchanges with Shylock do not shy away from the depictions of appalling behaviour. We get him being spat upon him with impunity, calling him names without response and treating him like a dog until he is defeated. He then leaves the stage on a slow walk, searching for his own dignity and taking a little bit of ours with him.
The cast provide us with a range of subtly poised performances. We still get the set pieces of the caskets, which work so well and make us laugh, and the final courtroom drama is as good a depiction of dramatic irony as you will see. But at the same time, there are intriguing influences within this version, not least the full-on suggestion of homo-erotica between Antonio and Bassanio.
Whilst not wholly convinced that the text supports such a full-frontal, tongues wrapped around tonsils examination of that potentially gay relationship, director Arin Arbus explores, pushes, questions and challenges us and the text. It's wholly acceptable to present challenges for your audience with such a rich text—Shakespeare, if anyone can, can take it.
The rich textual joy that is Shakespeare is enhanced even further by the cast’s ability to give the audience a performance beyond the words but recognising that the words are the balance, the ballast, the inspiration for their performance.
Arbus has given us a Merchant of Venice for the age, updated to the present day with plenty of mobile phone coverage on the set, which Riccardo Hernandez, as the scenic designer, has backdropped with a functional set strikingly high and poised.
Shakespeare can take that push, that stretch, that ability to try and give us something new, give us something that is more likely to speak to us now than give us a new version of Brook’s Deadly Theatre and here is delivered an ending which is heartbreaking.
Countered by the scenes before when we are delighted at the triumph of an anti-Semite, who is teased over the ring he has given away, we root for his forgiveness. It leaves a discordant note, and whilst Balthasar slams down Antonio’s cases to make him leave, denying the subplot ending of a tryst between Antonio and Bassanio, there is still something challenging about having their ending as one of triumph. Perhaps the solution to the problem play is to merely uncover a new problem. The involvement of Jessica, questioning her choices, as opposed to revelling in them gives this much more credence, however, it brings us to the final act of Shakespeare’s one where the audience return to traditional expectations of this text: back slapping and how clever they all were to beat the Jew. They seemed unmoved by that final walk of shame and the unfairness of the judgment prior.
By giving us this ending, the company manages to deliver a vow. Kol Nidre, the opening prayer of Yom Kippur, is recited by both Shylock and Jessica. It was one of those moments in theatre where not a pin is dropped, but we all shared a moment. It was quite mystical and utterly magical and is the prevailing memory not just of a week in which the worst excesses of humanity have been remembered, but also the simple inhumanity to mind that we all perceive, see in a time of great challenge on our streets and in social media—daily.
It is a vow that we should individually take account of and make sure that we do not fall victim to joining the mob, but for being a ballast as they once would have it against prejudice of any sort.