For its15^th birthday and 30^th production the inimitable, irrepressible and energy-driven Bacchanals repertory company is once again upsetting apple carts and cocking a snook at theatrical conventions, right-wing politics and murderous monarchs. 

David Lawrence’s Richard III starts with the coronation of Edward IV but then the entire court suddenly morphs into a cod (under-rehearsed) Broadway opening dance number. 

One should have expected something was up when one first sees the rag bag costumes the courtiers are wearing. Later on two murderers appear as a couple of famous cartoon characters but mercifully one of them doesn’t resort to saying “Holy Sardines!” The mistress to the entire male aristocracy, Jane Shore, does, however, carry fur-lined handcuffs and a small whip. 

At times it is as if Black Adder, Monty Python, and the Marx Brothers had taken over the production with pertinent topical references thrown into the mix; a fictitious book by Nicky Hager sold at Mutiny Books, for example.

Unfortunately Richard III is one of Shakespeare’s longest plays and no notice has been paid to The Reduced Shakespeare Company’s ability to severely abridge especially when there are complex scenes of dynastic and family relationships that are raced through, despite the presence on the stage floor of a genealogical tree.

There is a good deal of outrageous comedy (‘selfies’, however, are no longer funny) but twice during the play the dramatic tension of the wooing of Lady Anne by Richard and later the confrontation between Richard and his mother the Duchess of York (Brianne Kerr) are riveting because they are well acted and Shakespeare is not overloaded with directorial accretions.

In keeping with the overall style David Lawrence’s Richard eschews the bottled spider and bunch-backed toad approach and appears more like a psychotic Mad Hatter in red sneakers. While his nemesis Richmond (Joe Dekkers-Reihana) is a camp poseur in a sexy white costume.

And both actors and the production come into their own at the very end with an hilarious and superbly staged cartoon-like Battle of Bosworth. (With umbrellas would you believe?)  It’s just a pity some scissors weren’t applied to the script.

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Who knew The Tragedy of King Richard III was a satirical political comedy? 

The Bacchanals have kicked off Wellington’s unofficial mini-festival of three Shakespeares within a month with Richard III (the others being Bright Orange Walls’ Twelfth Night, opening 25 Jan, and Victoria University Summer Shakespeare’s Timon of Athens, opening 13 Feb).

Consciously continuing in the same “tragical-comical-historical-political vein” as their most recent productions (of Dean Parker’s Once We Built A Tower, Jessica Swale’s Blue Stockings and Shakespeare’s Coriolanus), The Bacchanals pitch their Richard III – “Shakespeare’s classic tale of how a whole country can ignore the evidence and elect a lying villain as their leader!” – thus: “The Smiling Assassin defies the odds and the pollsters to rise from the grave, stronger than ever! Watch him laugh in the face of his country as he lies, spies, derps, planks, triple-handshakes and murders his way to the top!!!” Not that the kings and queens of England are elected, but it is important to generate approval among the common folk before a new monarch is crowned. 

What we get, then, is a ‘Classic-cum Marvel Comics’ take on Shakespeare’s early-period historical tragedy (usually listed among the histories), with quite a bit of performance hyperbole thrown in for good – or not so good – measure.

Bacchanals director David Lawrence – who embodied a formidable Iago in the Lord Lackbeards’ Othello last year and has played John Key in many of James Nokise’s PSA political satires (though not in last year’s Election Special) – delights in playing the titular Dick. Although given to furtive glances at the audience (direct and purposeful eye-contact is much more effective), he signals the Duke of Gloucester’s dissembling stratagems with vaudevillian flair, greatly enhanced by his total mastery of the text.

Indeed, as we’ve come to expect from The Bacchanals, the whole cast delivers the play with an intelligent assurance that ensures we understand what’s going on even if great wodges of words evade specific comprehension (they are not given to editing Shakespeare). Because they know what it’s all about, and believe it and ‘live it’, we somehow ‘get it’.

That said, while the cast is undoubtedly privy to the rationales for a number of design and character choices, some of them bemuse rather than amuse me. Later a colleague suggests aficionados of Monty Python will recognise a slew of tropes. But the Two Murderers (Hilary Penwarden and Alice May Connolly) as Batman and Robin? Thomas Bouchier, Lord Cardinal (Uther Dean), in a Bishop’s mitre and Santa Claus cloak? A citizen (Kirsty Bruce) covered in cats? Henry Tudor, Earl of Richmond (Joe Dekkers-Reihana), destined to become Henry VII, the first Tudor king, camping it up like Richard Simmons’ Kiwi cousin?

Yet when I notice the embittered James Tyrell (Hilary Penwarden) is described as “a disgraced cabinet minister” in the programme, her blonde hair, garish spectacles and blue frock make me smile. And it doesn’t detract from the strength of the moment, after the murders of Princes Richard (Mia van Oven) and Edward (Maddie Gillespie), when Tyrell discovers s/he has a conscience.

The citizens who switch their allegiances between Richard III and his opponents – William, Lord Hastings (Alex Greig) and the Duke of Buckingham (Salesi Le’ota) – in the lead-up to the Battle of Bosworth, are clad in green plastic ponchos and brandish yellow plastic brollies, like a chorus line from Singin’ In The Rain. But when I interpret this ‘foul weather friends’, I like that too.

The link to contemporary Kiwi politics is sheeted home with a blatantly parodied political hoarding and when the Scrivener (Ellie Stewart) launches her indictment – Filthy Monarchy by Nicky Hager – at Mutiny Books: delightfully done.

A number of elements save the broadly comical devices – some may say gimmicks – from trivialising the story too much. In the traverse-cum-thrust space of Bats’ Dome auditorium, the stage is marked out with family trees and red tape is slashed across those who die, giving new meaning to ‘blood lines’.

Of the men, Alex Greig and Salesi Le’ota are especially strong in grounding the play in credible jeopardy and accountability. But it is the women who bring the most powerful emotional truth and expose the story’s moral centre: Kirsty Bruce’s Elizabeth Wydville, queen to Edward IV; Ania Upstill’s Lady Anne Neville, widow of Prince Edward; Ellie Stewart’s Margaret of Anjou, widow to King Henry VI; and – most formidable yet heart-rending – Brianne Kerr’s Duchess of York, mother of the loveless Richard.

Their scenes together are the most compelling. And it is mostly in his scenes with them that Lawrence’s Richard is truly challenged to manifest his winning charm and privilege-sourced charisma, compelled to face the truth and made most vulnerable, allowing us to see ourselves in him.

Fleeting glimpses of Kerr’s ‘mistress to all’, Jane Dorset, show up the men’s shonky morals. Jean Sergent gives a business-like Catesby, and is an ebullient host for the night’s proceedings. Michael Ness, Michael Trigg and Aidan Weekes complete the adult cast – and the two other children, Ned and Meg Plantagenet, are charmingly played by Aidan Gillespie and Iris Polaschek (alternating with Olivia Moxley).

Overall The Bacchanals Richard III is a memorable satirical romp with bite.

Footnote: 
Interest in the actual Richard III was rejuvenated two years ago when his remains were found beneath a Leicester carpark, on the site of Grey Fiars Church. The last English king to fall in battle, on Bosworth field, he died from a fatal halberd blow to the base of his skull, on 22 August 1485, whereupon experts have deduced his body was stripped, mocked and mutilated before his unceremonious burial. And yes, he was a ‘crook back’: scoliosis of the spine rather than crippled with the useless left arm, limp and hunchback Shakespeare suggests. Lawrence goes with the hump but loses it at Bosworth.

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