Twelfth Night

"I've never read Twelfth Night," I said to L, "but I always hear people talk about it. It has twins, and disguises, and mistaken identities, and hijinks. It'll be fun to watch a comedy for once!"

So we went to see Twelfth Night by Bell Shakespeare at the Sydney Opera House.

Surprise! It was not fun. It was mildly traumatic.

Well, okay, most of it was fun. But, spoilers, they played the Malvolio subplot as realism instead of farce, and it was kind of upsetting. Especially since they had genderswapped the character to be Malvolia, and that made the situation feel way more vulnerable. More later.


Genderplay

There were things I did like! Twelfth Night explores gender and sexuality, and this production does some interesting things with that.

When Viola first appears, she is played by a female actor. Then when she disguises herself as Cesario, the character is played by a male actor - who then continues in the role of Viola for the rest of the story.

When Sebastian first appears, he is played by the same female actor who played Viola - who then continues in the role of Sebastian for the rest of the story.

For first time viewers like me and L, it did cause some temporary confusion figuring out which twin was which. The synopsis in the program book helped.

What I liked about this casting was how it changed the dynamics of the romantic relationships:
- The tension in the flirtation-in-disguise scenes was with opposite gender actors.
- The celebration in the happily-ever-after scenes was with same gender actors.

In addition, as mentioned, the character of Malvolia was genderswapped, and the character of Antonio was crosscast. I remember how it blew my mind years ago when Cassius was played by a woman, and now this kind of practice has become commonplace. This is one change in theatre I really love.


Music

The other highlight for me was the music! All the songs in Twelfth Night were set to music by Sarah Blasko, who transformed Shakespeare's original lyrics into pop ballads. Gorgeous and melancholy and wistful, and sung beautifully by Feste, accompanied by piano.


Malvolia

So the program book summary for this subplot is, "Sir Toby, his friend Sir Andrew, the fool Feste, and chambermaid Maria play a trick on a pompous steward, Malvolia. They forge a love letter to her in Olivia's hand, convincing Malvolia to present herself to Olivia dressed in ridiculous clothing. After Malvolia does so, they lock her in a dark room and taunt her, pretending she has gone mad."

I remember reading once about a test screening for a comedy movie. In one scene, a piano falls on someone, squashing them. A classic slapstick trope. But in the test screening, a trickle of blood comes from under the piano. The test audience did not like it. That touch of realism broke their immersion.

I feel like the director of this production either:

(1) thought that Malvolio had always been treated horribly, and she wanted to pull out the fridge horror aspects to hammer the point home, or
(2) thought that there were already hundreds of productions that played it straight, and she wanted to do a dark and edgy version of this particular subplot.

Me? I just wanted fun hijinks! Not whatever this was.

( Detailed spoilers )

Thoughts

If art is supposed to inspire emotion or make you think, well, it certainly worked. If I've spent a disproportionate amount of this post on a relatively small part of the story, well, it probably reflects what was taking up my headspace afterward.

I'm still not decided on how I should feel about it. I'm very hesitant to say to an artist, "You shouldn't have tried that." But on the other hand, does the artist have a responsibility to the audience? Are there promises made about the tone and content of a story? How do you balance an audience already familiar with the story and excited for new permutations on it, with an audience experiencing the story for the very first time? And will L be up for another Shakespearean comedy any time soon?