Theatre review: The Comedy of Errors (Shakespeare's Globe)

Sean Holmes liked a touch of European avant garde theatre when he was running the Lyric Hammersmith, and since coming to Shakespeare's Globe he's been responsible for some of the more eye-catching high-concept productions there, but this year he gets the tights and codpieces of the more "heritage" shows for The Comedy of Errors. There's also a hint of Les Misérables as the show opens, with flag-waving and singing about how great Ephesus is, and how they've fought back against the injustices done to them by Syracuse, with a hostile environment (/automatic death sentence) for any Syracusians who wash up on their shores. This is bad news for a number of the characters, but particularly Egeus (Paul Rider,) who's the only one to get caught. Egeus was shipwrecked while searching for his long-lost identical twin sons, and their identical twin servants.

They'll all get reunited in the course of this day, but only after the two pairs of masters and servants get mistaken for each other in a variety of configurations. There's also some stuff about chains, but not in that way.

This is Shakespeare's shortest play, even shorter once Holmes has taken the scissors to it to let it run straight through at under two hours without an interval; the sound design and Grant Olding's music gee the action along in quite a cinematic style.I think it's a fair enough approach: The Comedy of Errors is a lot of silly and convoluted excuses for slapstick confusion, and while generally fun has always been somewhere around the middle of the canon for me - not much to actively dislike, but never one to get too excited about.

And that's largely what we get, an entertaining enough afternoon that sometimes takes things up a notch with some very fun setpieces. Some of the way the action's sped up is in the way Antipholus (Matthew Broome) and Dromio (George Fouracres) of Ephesus speak to each other in the snappy style of a madcap double-act, shooting gags at each other (and perhaps acknowledging that not every joke has stood the test of time, so why spend too much time on them.) By contrast Antipholus (Michael Elcock) and Dromio (Jordan Metcalfe) of Syracuse nod more to the way the latter's speech often seems like stand-up comedy; it's a low-key running gag that when an interesting subject matter comes up the master will let the servant take the floor to do a little routine on it.

Last year the Globe used Philip Cumbus as a kind of universal stand-in for anyone who might be taken sick - I don't think I know any two people who saw him in the same part - so it's nice to see him back as a proper ensemble member (maybe his unrecognisable stint in The Crown gave him some bargaining power as well.) He shows why he deserves to be a central part of the company by making hihglights out of two roles, one of which isn't even meant to be that funny: The Duke gets some laughs out of Egeus' opening Basil Exposition speech with his reactions, as he finds it all terribly moving but obviously can't do anything about the law to cut the man's head off. And then one of those characters who's meant to be a comic highlight but falls horribly flat 99% of the time: The outrageous quack Dr Pinch, here given a massive codpiece and the added gag that he's trying to get Antipholus committed because he thinks he can steal his wife Adriana (Laura Hanna.)

I wonder how much longer the fat-shaming running joke about the amorous unseen cook Nell will keep being left in the script? Here, the camp edge to Metcalfe's Dromio gives a slightly different angle to his terror at her advances, but it's still something of a low blow, even by Shakespeare's standards. Holmes' production has some added silent scenes of slapstick violence (by Maisie Carter) which add to the sense of Ephesus being something of a chaotically dangerous place. There's also emphasis which shows there's many more references than I'd realised to the residents possibly being evil witches. It doesn't quite excuse how the pair from Syracuse completely fail to realise the confusion is caused by the identical twins they are actively trying to find, but does provide a handy hand-waving explanation for why they instantly panic at everything weird that happens.

This is a production with a speedy running time that feels even shorter, always a good sign. I can't say it carried me on waves of laughter throughout (and why Paul Wills' design has chosen to hang a large ship's mast from the galleries, adding more obstructions to a venue that already makes you peer around pillars to see parts of the stage, is anyone's guess,) but when it hits the right note it runs with it.

The Comedy of Errors by William Shakespeare is booking in repertory until the 29th of July at Shakespeare's Globe.

Running time: 1 hour 50 minutes straight through.

Photo credit: Marc Brenner.