Peter Viney's Blog

By William Shakespeare
Directed by Michael Longhurst
Set & Costume by Jon Bauser
Songwriter SuRie

Royal Shakespeare Company
Royal Shakespeare Theatre
Stratford Upon Avon
Friday 25th April 2025, 19.15

CAST
Beatrice – Freema Agyeman
Leonato – Peter Forbes
Antonio – Tanya Franks
Hero- Eleanor Wellington Cox
Margaret – Gina Bramhill
Ursula / Ensemble – Lydia Fraser

Benedick – Nick Blood
Claudio – Daniel Adeosun
Don Pedro- Oliver Huband
Don John – Nojan Khazai
Borachio- Jay Taylor
Conrade – Azan Ahmed

Dogberry – Antonio Magro
Verges – Nick Cavaliere
Sexton / ensemble – Flaminia Cinque
Seacole / The Friar / ensemble – Arthur Wilson
Balthasar / Oatcake / Ensemble – Posi Morakinyo
Ensemble – Megan Keaveny

The second major production of 2025. This will be the “Footballers’ Wives” one, or as they’re not married yet, the WAGs one,

I immediately fall for the concept. Instead of soldiers returning from war, we have the modern substitute. The star footballers of Messina FC are returning from their European final victory against Madrid.
When you go in, the projected score is Messina 1. Madrid 2.

There are side screens. Projection on a top screen and side screen is used frequently. Leonato (Peter Forbes) is now the club owner, and the team are sponsored by Leocom. With his slick black hair and shiny suit, he looks Sicilian, in the New Jersey sense of the word. Would he pass the football league’s requirements for fit and proper owner? Yeah, of course. Just look at others who have.

Don Pedro (Oliver Huband) is the charismatic manager. We get the quarter final result where Messina beat Manchester 2-0, and the semi-final where they beat Munich 2-0. The club’s badge and mascot is a bull’s head like Lamborghini.

We see the team line up projected. Benedick is in midfield and captain and number 8. Claudio is number 7, and a striker. Don John is number 13, and was a substitute. When we meet him his foot is in a cast. No wonder he’s pissed off. The side screens run through the team members.

The projection changes as Claudio scores twice, getting a hat trick and victory in extra time. Yes, be seated at least 5 minutes before the start. The treasured RSC pre-show is back, albeit on screens and soundtrack.

We move to Leonato’s villa, where the team have been invited. Lines change but fit so instead of Beatrice, now a football reporter, saying ‘How many men did he kill,’ of Benedick, she says, “How many goals did he score?’ And her insult is ‘Signor Own Goal.’ Benedick declines to be interviewed by her. They have previous.

I approve. I would go further than they did, so instead of addressing Don Pedro as ‘my lord’ I would have had the players say ‘guv’ nor.’ Maybe a step too far, and confusing because in the original text, it is Leonato who is Governor. Though the Watch change Leonato to ‘the boss.’

The players arrive in football kit, jumping up and down and chanting as if at the end of a final. Lots of male bonding. The women are dressed, well, as WAGs. Then the players leap in the pool, as they do. The general misogyny in a tight all male group of footballers (read the tabloids) works with the plot.

It is a wonderful looking production, set and costumes throughout are vibrant. The set is fluid.

We have a bathing pool and later a fountain. What looks like a stadium tunnel at the start, fills and becomes the villa with Hero’s full picture window bedroom upstairs. The pool is like a dressing room communal bath and is utilized throughout.

I always find the masked ball scene hard to carry off, but here they do it differently. Only the footballers have masks, a black bull’s head. They wear the official team travelling suits, light grey, bull badge, blue tie. There is one gold bull, presumably for Man of The Match, and Claudio switches it to Don Pedro, who is pretending to be him and setting up the marriage to Hero. The women don’t have masks, but look at the text. They don’t need them.

The concept alters balances. Leonato is now Don Pedro’s superior and employer. That switches things. This is not the first time brother Antonio has become Antonia, but it is usually as Leonato’s sister. She is now his wife. Hero’s servant, Margaret, is now a willing plotter, though they retain the lines about her being innocent and duped later, though we know she wasn’t. Maybe Borachio was showing unexpected gallantry. She has a much more complex role. Early on, she is with Leonato while he FaceTimes Antonia. This is projected on the screens, and Leonato does the speech to Antonia grimacing while apparently receiving a blow job from Margaret. I assume it’s as Margaret rather than just the same actress. This may be the point where many say “Shakespeare did NOT write that’ but it was brief, and I laughed at his facial contortions. It indicates a world where males are ‘serviced’ rather than ‘make love.’

Freema Agyeman is doing Beatrice right after doing Olivia in the RSC Twelfth Night. They realised on seeing her Olivia that she was a perfect Estuary accented and powerful Beatrice. It’s almost always a role for a famous and older actor, but we saw her in Twelfth Night and I would have instantly cast her as Beatrice too.

Nick Blood is also a younger Benedick. Mind you, the football setting excludes the more normal forty something famous name. He breaks the fourth wall with ease. However, he’s not the young star like Claudio. The captain’s role is for a senior member of the squad. We sense, as in Beatrice’s ‘Signor Own goal’ that he may be past his peak, more Jamie Vardy or Harry Kane than Jude Bellingham.

The overhearing scene starts on a massage table (the masseur is a fine addition) and he has to remove his boxer shorts under a towel first, then has only the towel to cover his modesty. The climax to the scene is inevitable and he milks it superbly.

I like the RSC return to the stars of tomorrow rather than names of today in casting this. Lines get new readings. When Beatrice is sent to summon Benedick for dinner, she says, “You have no stomach’ meaning ‘you are not hungry.’ As he is only wearing boxer shorts he looks down at his flat tummy and grins ‘Thank you.’

For the second time this year we get a strong Claudio and Hero too. These used to be thought of as wet roles but not this year. Daniel Adeosun as Claudio, is a beefy striker who may have headed a ball too often for his own good. Eleanor Wellington Cox is a total visual contrast, slight and blonde. She is also a strong singer and a strong dancer.

Eleanor Wellington Cox gets one song full on, and another recorded and projected at her funeral. At the end of the party, Leonato sings My Way at full volume, as admirers of Sinatra will do. The Margaret and Borachio bonking is graphic, and extended, and seen through that large picture window to the cheerful accompaniment of Cyndi Lauper’s Girls Just Wanna Have Fun. Neither of the ‘found’ songs are credited in the programme. I find that really poor, not for the first time.

Some reviews thought concern over Hero’s maiden status odd in the context, but it is the night before the wedding! Similarly we know that Leonato is a sexual predator, which undermines his fatherly outrage. However, he plays it with fury. It is a matter of honour rather than parental concern. The play is set in Sicily.

Oliver Huband is an excellent Don Pedro. As the manager, he has an intimate relationship with the team. He is addressed as Sweet Prince, but then Jose Mourinho liked to be called The Special One. Note the physicality of the football field, the hugging the kissing, the jumping on top of each other. The photo above says it all. That’s what they do. He comes across as a commanding figure too.

The Watch are now security guards, with Verges and Dogberry doing a classic ‘little and large’ act. I was surprised when reviews of the recent Jamie Lloyd production with Tom Hiddleston applauded the removal of the Watch, which many apparently find tedious every time. I don’t and it doesn’t have to be irritating, as long as it focuses on visual humour over wordplay … and cuts a lot of the wordplay. They’re good here, with great background acting later from Dogberry.

There is constant background movement for the cast. During the long party, those speaking come to front stage but the rest writhe and dance to muted music behind, When we see a stag party out front, with the lads dressed as Roman soldiers, we can also see a silent hen party in Hero’s bedroom upstairs, with the girls dressed in replica Messina football shirts.

A major feature is technology. The actors can film each other at will with iPhones and they are projected on the long narrow side screens and on the central top screen above the stage. When onstage filming became popular a few years ago it was small video cameras. I think just using a plain iPhone is a first. Similarly as we move into the ‘tragedy’ of the wedding rejection, we get multiple tweets projected all over the theatre. You can only read a few, but they were along the lines of OMFG! And Tart! And Fuck no! And “Team’s done now’. And ‘my heart bleeds for her.’ There were several inarticulate and half-finished ones. They were very much like Private Eye spoof online discussions and I wish I could have noted more, but there are dozens of them and they change. I bet it was fun composing them.

We need to address the reviews. Most of the major papers went for 3 stars. Mark Lawson in the Guardian wrote:
Less happily, the footballing cliche about a game of two halves also applies to the production. After halftime, as football kit gives way to wedding gear, the metaphor visually vanishes. Also, a common football-managerial complaint about the pace of play – moving the ball faster here, tactically slowing things down there – is something director Michael Longhurst might look at before a second elsewhere.
The Guardian 23 April 2025

I know why the reviews stay middling Championship, and I reckon the production is better than that. Definitely Premier League for me. All of us saw the Jamie Lloyd production with Tom Hiddleston just weeks ago, set in Ibiza dance clubs, so also high concept, contemporary vivid setting. They dropped Dogberry and the Watch which several reviewers agreed with. They are restored here. The thing is there is about an hour’s difference in running time. This is nearly an hour longer. I have done an ELT adapted version of the play. I have edited another ELT version. I have worked on cutting. In spite of the text changes and the high concept, this is actually a remarkably faithful version of the plot. They do scenes and speeches which others, including me, cut. So it’s very different and just a few weeks after that short sharp all singing and dancing version, it feels long. I don’t think it would in any other year. Reviews note the change of pace and mood in the second half, but that really is intrinsic to the play. It’s an inevitable issue. Blame Shakespeare. The moods are hard to tie together, though I can see why not having the watch and getting through it fast, as Jamie Lloyd did, helps. Three stars is far too miserly. I would say an easy five (Premier League place in Europe) for most of the first half, but perhaps slipping to a four overall, but that will not be the first time that’s been my judgement on the play.

**** 1/2
I linked this review to the previous versions, and decided it merited at least another half star.

The RSC shop has Much Ado 25 football shirts and shorts with a signed display shirt. Great idea, but why is it red with black shorts and an RSC badge? Messina play in blue with blue shorts. I can see someone wanting a replica Messina shirt with 8 Benedick or 7 Claudio as a souvenir, but a red shirt and red scarf and red beanie doesn’t do it, even if the RSC logo is red.

WHAT THE CRITICS SAID

5 star
West End Best Friend *****
David Fox, Brum Hour *****

4 Star
The Times ****
Philip Rowe, East Midlands Theatre ****

3 star
Mark Lawson The Guardian ***
Fiona Mountford, The Telegraph ***
Michael Davies, What’s On Stage ***
TheatreCat ***
Raphael Kohn, All That Dazzles ***
Graham Wyles, Stage Talk ***

2 star
Dave Fargnoli, The Stage **

LINKS ON THIS BLOG

MUCH ADO ABOUT NOTHING

• Much Ado About Nothing- Wyndhams, 2011 David Tennant, Catherine Tate
• Much Ado About Nothing – Old Vic 2013 James Earl Jones, Vanessa Redgrave
• Much Ado About Nothing – Globe 2014
• Much Ado About Nothing – RSC 2014 (aka Love’s Labour’s Won), Edward Bennett 
• Much Ado About Nothing – RSC 2016 revival, + Lisa Dillon
• Much Ado About Nothing – Globe 2017
• Much Ado About Nothing – Rose, Kingston 2018, Mel Giedroyc
• Much Ado About Nothing, Northern Broadsides, on tour, Salisbury 2019
• Much Ado About Nothing, RSC 2022
• Much Ado About Nothing, National Theatre 2022, Katherine Parkinson
• Much Ado About Nothing, Watermill, 2024
• Much Ado About Nothing, Globe, 2024
• Much Ado About Nothing, Jamie Lloyd Company 2025, Tom Hiddleston, Hayley Atwell
• Much Ado About Nothing, RSC 2025
• Much Ado About Nothing – FILM – Joss Whedon, 2013

MICHAEL LONGHURST (Director)
Private Lives, by Noël Coward, Donmar 2023
Caroline or Change, Chichester Minerva 2017
Amadeus, National Theatre 2017
The Winter’s Tale – Wanamaker Playhouse, 2016
Carmen Disruption by Simon Stephens, Almeida Theatre, 2015
‘Tis Pity She’s A Whore – Wanamaker Playhouse, by John Ford

PETER FORBES
Assassins by Stephen Sondheim, Chichester 2023
Jack Absolute Rides Again, National Theatre, 2022
FREEMA AGYEMAN
Twelfth Night, RSC 2025 (Olivia)
TANYA FRANKS
The Truth by Florian Zeller, Menier Chocolate Factory 2016
NOJAN KHAZAI
English by Sannaz Toosi, The Other Place, RSC 2024
ANTONIO MAGRO
The Game of Love & Chance by Marivaux, Salisbury 2011
JAY TAYLOR
Nell Gwynn, by Jessica Swale, The Globe 2015