The Play: Coriolanus by William Shakespeare
The Company: Bell Shakespeare Company
The Theatre: The Fairfax Studio at the Arts Centre
Until: Season Closed
Stars: 4
There are 33 plays attributed to Shakespeare. There are around ten that a regularly performed on state. You know them: Romeo and Juliet, Macbeth, A Midsummer Night's Dream, King Lear, Much Ado About Nothing, Othello, Hamlet, Henry V, Richard III, Twelfth Night, As You Like it, Julius Caesar...
Coriolanus is in the next tier of plays, occasionally performed. It's there with Antony and Cleopatra, The Taming of the Shrew, the early Henry IVs and VIs (all five of them), A Winter's Tale and Measure for Measure. They do get performed - just not as often, and they're frequently undersubscribed. People are sort of aware of them, but you don't get the opportunity to see them.
Then there's the ones that don't get performed except under duress or some company is trying to get their name out there. King John, Timon of Athens, Pericles, Love's Labours Lost and the hyper-violent Titus Andronicus (where the king's children are baked into a pie). (As an aside, I've been looking at the theatre listing in London while I'm there - interestingly, the RSC is putting on Titus Andronicus while I've over there... it's worth considering... Though seeing Sam Heughan as Macbeth in Stratford would be something to behold... pity that starts in the week I get back to Australia).
Anyway...
So going into Coriolanus this afternoon, I knew two things. It's set in Rome. And I saw a production of it in the nineties where Steven Berkoff provided a Neo-Nazi setting. It was stylised. It was very good on recollection.
This Coriolanus was also very, very good.
Coriolanus is a play about military and political might, downfall and exile. We first meet Caius Marius (Hazem Shammas) a brutal general and defender of Rome, he's back from battle and is raised to serve the people as a member of the senate. Renamed Coriolanus, after the major battle he won at Corioli, he makes a complete ass of himself and is banished from Rome, much to the chagrin of his mother Volumnia (Brigid Zengeni) and his wife Virgilia (Suzannah MacDonald).
While in exile, he gets in league with Aufidius (Anthony Taufa), one of his enemies who wants to take over Rome. In the background, his old mentor, Menenius (Peter Carroll) tries to reel him back.
And like all good Shakespearean tragedies, he dies in the end, only after having the epiphany that, “Like a dull actor now, I have forgot my part, and I am out, even to a full disgrace.”
This ran for nearly three hours - but it didn't feel like it. The ultimate sign of a good Shakespeare. Also, not having the solid knowledge of the play as a crutch, everything was understandable.
Hazem Shammas was excellent as the belligerent Coriolanus, bringing a huge amount of energy with the right amount of depth to allow the audience to have some compassion for him. I also loved Peter Carroll's rendition of Menenius. Carroll is in his early eighties, and he gave the role humanity and gravitas.
Thankfully, at the start of the play, one of the cast gave the audience a rundown of what was happening in Rome, introducing us to the upper classes (who ran the senate) and the plebians, or working class, who had two tributes, the representative voices, who brought the nearest thing to a democracy to Rome - with little luck.
As with most Bell Shakespeare productions, the set was inventive and there was a lot to like with the moving rostra which came and went from under a curtain at the back of the stage. It was occasionally underlit, but that's allowable for dark play.
For me, the best thing about the play was the costumes, particularly the plebian tributes, who were dressed in cheap suits and looked like they'd come off an episode of The Office. And as always, all of the actors wore excellent boots - it's a Bell Shakespeare failsafe.
The play belongs to Hazem Shammas, who brought so much to this contrary role. He's predominately a stage actor but can be seen in a lot of local television shows. He's one to watch.
Being the last performance in a six-month run, the show received a standing ovation by many. It was well deserved. Making a little-known, lesser-played Shakespeare relevant and enjoyable is a feat.
I look forward to seeing what the Bell Shakespeare Company bring to us next year. It's wonderful to have Shakespeare in my life. There should be more of it.
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