Botanic Gardens, Glasgow
Four Stars
From the moment the somewhat seasoned lovers romp on
the chaise longue at one end of the Kibble Palace, alpha-male privilege abounds
in Bard in the Botanics’ fresh take on one of Shakespeare’s most grown-up plays
that forms part of the company’s Star Cross’d Lovers season. Andy Clark’s
Antony is a man who simply can’t stop conquering. Shirking every responsibility
he’s got while off the leash abroad, his mid-life crisis ego trip finds him
playing away to the max.
Cleopatra too has got her second emotional wind and is
going for it big time by way of epic mood-swings that are are a heady mix of
passion and needy insecurity. Cooper’s Cleopatra all but whoops on learning of
the death of Antony’s (third) wife Fulvia, even though it’s this incident that
puts nations as well as hearts at stake. If Antony wants his cake as well as
eating it when he marries Octavius Caesar’s kid sister Octavia, it’s
international diplomacy as much as conjugal rights that are doomed.
With director Gordon Barr’s adaptation stripped down
to accommodate a cast of eight, such a relatively minimal approach allows the
political ramifications of the central romance to breathe unencumbered by
assorted entourages. Clark and Cooper are perfect foils here, with Clark’s charismatic
roughshod swagger a sinewy counterpoint to Cooper’s vivacious intelligence.
There is some fine sparring elsewhere too, with the confrontation between
Cleopatra and Leonora Cooke’s Octavia a searing insight of what happens when
the scorned wife meets the other woman.
There is fine support too from Adam Donaldson as a
flintily driven Octavius. But it is Cooper’s Cleopatra who goes from strength
to strength here. She seems to grow in stature even as she makes the grandest
of gestures in this ferocious study of a world-changing affair.
The Herald, May 25th 2018
Ends
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