Shakespeare's Globe is staging The Winter's Tale (to 16 April 2023) is the first production in the theatre's year-long celebration of the 400th anniversary of the First Folio.
First performed in 1611, it was included in the collection of plays published, in 1623, as Mr William Shakespeare's Comedies, Histories and Tragedies.
This was some seven years after Shakespeare's death and is considered one of the most influential books ever published.
The First Folio also included The Comedy of Errors, Macbeth and As You Like It, and these plays also form part of the Shakespeare's Globe 2023 season, along with A Midsummer Night's Dream.
Shakespeare's Globe
Shakespeare's Globe itself, which stands on the south bank of the River Thames, is a reconstruction of the Globe Theatre, the Elizabethan playhouse that once stood on or near the current site and for which William Shakespeare wrote his plays.
The Winter's Tale images : Tristram Kenton
The Winter's Tale
With The Winter's Tale, as with all of the Bard's plays, a spoiler alert is not to be shunned.
And though not one of Shakespeare's most universally popular works, it certainly stands the test of time if tackled in the right way.
Needless-to-say the play is in safe hands at Shakespeare's Globe where, for the first time, audiences will move theatres during the performance, with the action alternating between Sicily (in the Sam Wanamaker Playhouse) and Bohemia (in the Globe Theatre).
The play opens with us in the intimate confines of the Playhouse, where the close confines serves to intensifies the drama that unfolds during the play's first three acts.
We eavesdrop as King Leontes comes to believe, without any foundation that his heavily pregnant wife Hermione has been unfaithful with his best friend King Polixenes.
The jealously that consumes Leontes devastates the king and all those he holds dear.
Following the interval, we are into 'open air' rural Bohemia in the Globe Theatre.
Hermione's daughter Perdita, who was born just before her demise, has been exiled here and raised for these last sixteen years by shepherds, and has fallen in love.
In contrast to the dramatic claustrophobia during the first part of The Winter's Tale, we are now in raucous comedic territory, with Ed Gaughan giving a comic masterclass as Autolycus.
And finally, back in the Sam Wanamaker, all loose ends are neatly tied in a happy ending that only Shakespeare could get away with.
This production of The Winter's Take places an onus on its audiences to go, if not the extra mile, then at least from one theatre to another and back again.
This might be seen as gimmick over theatrical imperative.
Happily, this is not the case as we are first gripped by high drama and then rocked by rollicking comedy.
It goes without saying that all of the cast and members of the company are excellent.
Praise must also go to Laura Moody and Richard Jones who create the perfect musical tone in both places.
www.shakespearesglobe.com/whats-on/the-winters-tale-2022
Other 2023 productions at Shakespeare's Globe include :
- A Midsummer Night's Dream (27 April to 12 August 2023)
- The Comedy of Errors (12 May to 29 July 2023)
- Macbeth (21 July to 28 October 2023), and
- As You Like It (18 August to 29 October 2023)