Not Too Tame, a company that, according to the programme, aims "to break down the barriers that often keep people away from theatre and showcase stories that resonate with working-class audiences" (as they also told me for the BTG podcast in 2022) and was the first to bring Shakespeare to Shakespeare North Playhouse, is making its second visit to the compact, in-the-round Cockpit Theatre stage with another lively interpretation of Shakespeare.
Jimmy Fairhurst's production is "inspired by the world of the music industry", although that is only really clear from the publicity, not from anything on the stage other than the scattered flight cases and speaker cabinets in a design by Good Teeth. However, many of the small cast are actor-musicians, Orsino is a rapper and the show is punctuated by songs from the last sixty years of rock and pop.
It opens with Louise Haggerty's Feste, a commanding presence throughout, asking the audience where they are from in the manner of a modern stand-up before launching the whole cast into an energetic rendering of The Rolling Stones' "Gimme Shelter", during which there are suggestions of both Viola's and Sebastian's separate escapes from the waves through choreography.
Composition is credited to the director's brother, Dean Fairhurst, whose band (it says three times in the programme) once opened for The Who, but there are other songs sung live—Olivia sings "Stay" by Shakespeare's Sister to an urn, presumably her dead brother—or as recordings—"Love Will Tear Us Apart" plays as Malvolio is left alone in his cell. Feste also closes the show with the rousing "S.O.B." by Nathaniel Rateliff & The Night Sweats as she officiates over a triple wedding.
The words are mostly Shakespeare's, but the dialogue often slips into more modern bawdiness with, perhaps, the occasional ad-lib and a bit of banter with the audience, giving the production a natural, improvisatory feel with the cast pulling off the transitions remarkably well. Not everything fits comfortably into the concept, however, with some scenes dragging a bit where the meaning of the dialogue isn't made clear (a very articulate young girl sat in from of me told me at the interval that she was struggling to follow the story).
Les Dennis makes Malvolio just comic enough to not be too ridiculous so that we can still feel for him later; while the production doesn't take the trick on him to the extremes of cruelty before his exit vowing revenge, the audience audibly expressed their sympathy for him on press night. But his outfit goes far beyond just yellow stockings and cross garters to be an overall creation to rival David Byrne's famous jacket in Stop Making Sense—we weren't sent any photos (it is much more impressive than his outfit in the publicity shots), perhaps to keep it as a surprise.
Reuben Johnson plays a great duo of slightly snobbish Orsino and irritatingly posh Andrew Aguecheek, supported for the latter by Jack Brown's arrogant Toby Belch. Sir Andrew's duel with Georgia Frost's Viola, who doesn't really change appearance as Cesario, is a comic wrestling match, which works well (Bethan Clark is fight and intimacy director).
There is often some suggestion of unrequited love from Antonio to Sebastian, but here, Antonia is played as female by Kate James in a St John's Ambulance uniform and her love for him made very clear. James doubles as Olivia's (Purvi Parmar) wily servant Maria, with Tom Sturgess completing the cast as Sebastian.
While perhaps the storytelling could be clearer for those not familiar with the play, the sheer energy and commitment of the cast carries off an entertaining production which was clearly designed to have the audience on its feet by the end, and that certainly worked on press night.