Troilus and Cressida RSC

Very excited by the casting for this!

Adjoa Andoh (Ulysses) is always good value. Daisy Badger (Helen) was a stand-out in Miss Littlewood. Desmond Barrit is a great choice for Pandarus. I very much enjoyed Amber James (Cressida) in Antony & Cleopatra. Sheila Reid's done plenty of Shakespeare before, an intriguing choice for Thersites! And a whole bunch of RSC regulars (from the last few years at least) swelling the ranks. It's definitely one of the more promising RSC casts we've had lately.

Not really. I don’t like Desmond Barrit, no talent for comedy at all despite the fact they keep casting him as if he has.

I intervene on this traumatic subject simply to absolve Steppenwolf from blame. The Wooster Group were the culprits. At the time on their website they posted a private recording of Rupert Goold phoning them to say sadly he was having to withdraw from the production due to unexpected film commitments - the best move he ever made despite the fact his film sunk without trace. 

At least now our old chum Honoured Guest has disappeared from the board we don’t have to at this point read a post from him saying it was a great production.

Looks like Des Barritt is out of the show (press release has been altered) but no mention of why.

Oliver Ford davies is now Pandarus and Jim Hooper is Nestor

Cast was good.
Set was good.
Quite liked the concept.

But Jesus Christ this play is awful. It felt excruciatingly long. And I honestly didn’t give a monkeys about most/all of the characters.

Fair play to the RSC for doing it, but not my cup of tea. 3/5

Good. The cast were all good. I just didn’t like the play - I think I was slightly hindered by the fact I’d read up a bit, and the friend I’d gone with told me a totally different ending to what actually happened, so we were both thoroughly confused.

There on 9 th

From cinema listings, it looks like there is an RSC live event scheduled for Nov 14th for the production.

Well this is a tough one.

On the production side I thought this was brilliant.

Of all people Gregory Doran shows Rufus Norris how to do post apocalyptic Shakespeare right. This is the first time in a while that he pulls his finger out and put some effort into this

The setting feels convincing with Doran taking the time for world building with the walls of Troy and the Greek tents. The costumes are nicely stylistic, part Greek-part mad max. There’s some great imagery used in this especially in the ending battle scenes.

And I loved the music here. Then again I seem to have an affinity for forboding percussive music since The Histories. But it fitted with the setting, was nicely atmospheric, loud and energetic at times.

The casting is mostly great. Gavin Fowler was very convincing as the idealistic Troilus and I enjoyed watching him change over time. Oliver Ford Davies is Oliver Ford Davies but it suited the role of Landarus

The gender changes were convincing in a world where rhyme and reason has gone in this never ending war. I was looking forward to seeing Adjoa Andoh and she doesn’t disappoint as a fiery Ulysses. She delivers the order soliloquy magnificently

The only miscast was Sheila Reid. Bless her because I loved her performance as Gower in Pericles but she does not convince as the vile mouthed Thersites. And whilst the Sam Wanamaker suited her little voice she was inaudible at times in the RST

The problem...the play is a 3 hour slog

As mentioned above the characters are not that interesting, the writing doesn’t sparkle and the action is unenaging following the some of the least interesting events of the Trojan wars. This is also where Shakespeare tries to be cynically satiric and tragic but fails to achieve both at the same

So yeah, 5 years after the terrible Wooster Group production I have finally seen brilliant production of Troilus and Cressida

I’m just hard pressed to recommend seeing the play itself

Troilus and Cressida was John Barton's favourite play. I have seldom seen a bad production of it (notwithstanding the Wooster Group farrago and a terrible original pronunciation one at the Globe) and all the others were either very good (eg. Trevor Nunn's Christian/Muslim one) or brilliant (eg. Michael Boyd's set in 1970s Belfast and Howard Davies' set during the Crimean War). Lynette: do you remember the Sam Mendes one in the Swan with Simon Russell-Beale at his brilliant best as Thersites ? I think a play that has had so many excellent productions must have some merit.