Theatre Review
Royal Shakespeare Company
The Tragedy of Thomas Hobbes
Written by Adriano Shaplin
Directed by Elizabeth Freestone
Wilton’s Music Hall
12 November – 6 December, 2008
A review by Tim Jeeves for EXTRA! EXTRA!
For the last two years, Adriano Shaplin has been using his time as the first RSC / Warwick International playwright in residence to develop a close working relationship with the company; spending substantial time in the rehearsal room alongside his more solitary writing work.
The Tragedy of Thomas Hobbes is the result of this collaboration, and I’m sad to report that it’s something of a disappointment.
It certainly looks good. Soutra Gilmour’s design sits well in the magnificence of Wilton’s Music Hall, and the costume – especially the eighties punk look of the two clowns – is equally pleasing on the eye. Similarly there are enough good performances going about for there to be no complaints about the actors; special mention deserved for Stephen Boxer in the title role and Angus Wright as the histrionic clown Rotten.
The production itself is definitely more than competent, though unfortunately the play itself lets the evening down.
If an audience is expected to sit through nearly three hours worth of performance, what is shown needs to be gripping and engaging and unfortunately the power intrigues that developed throughout the play weren’t developed enough to draw us in.
Robert Hooke’s rise over Hobbes and Newton’s subsequent succession to favour within the Royal Society has the makings of some real dramatic tension that could echo throughout history (think the dynamics of Blair, Brown and the recent infighting in the Labour Party) but it was never developed enough for us to really care. There was one scene between Hobbes and the King before the King cast him from favour, and from this one short encounter we were supposed to gain a sense of the breach of trust that Hobbes would have felt after a lifetime of being close to the King.
Not that it was all bad, the two clowns with their frustrations with and commentary on working in the theatre were generally funny at times – opening the second half with Rotten’s declamation of ’What is the meaning of this play? It’s ranting shit’ couldn’t fail to bring a smile to the audience’s faces.
But sadly, this was never going to be enough. With the dramatic tension amiss the play felt like an exercise in Brechtian theatre, though regrettably it was an exercise where the social commentary had similarly been cast adrift.
Ticket Info: £20
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www.wiltons.org.uk
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