Our latest trip to Stratford, courtesy of tickets from the IBM Warwick employee theatre club, was to see the oft maligned As You Like It. This is one of the few Shakespeare plays I had not seen at all. It has a reputation for being rather less substantial, implausible, and light on comedy and is sometimes included amongst the category of “problem plays”.
I absolutely loved it. The RSCs performance was superb. I was especially impressed by Katy Steven’s playing of Rosalind, yet another instance of a female character pretending to be a male for a while [a part that would, of course, have been played by a male originally when women were not allowed on the stage]. Even though the actor is an attractive and striking woman, and wore only limited make-up, her masculine mannerisms (body language. vocal patterns, etc.) were so well done the character did indeed seem a male to me.
A magical moment came from Forbes Mason’s playing of Jaques, philosopher strumming a guitar and singing to the audience, even asking us if we wanted “more?” and warning us that “It will make you melancholy…” His singing in high-register was magical.
Our seats were next to the stage at the extreme end of one side. We could touch the stage surface. The sudden appearence of a load of men through trapdoors that were through open suddenly, strongly, and loudly came as a bit of a shock, as dig the very convincening snow coming down onto the stage.
Personally, I saw no problems in this play. It was great fun, played to perfection by a superb cast.
