Theatre review: The Fantastic Follies of Mrs Rich, or, The Beau Defeated

Restoration comedy has been having a moment lately, and after the efforts of Southwark Playhouse and the Donmar Warehouse comes the RSC to provide the element that's been missing so far: A production that actually works as a comedy. Mary Pix's The Fantastic Follies of Mrs Rich, more commonly known as The Beau Defeated, has as daft and convoluted a plot as any in the genre but crucially, in Jo Davies' production at least, it's possible to actually follow. There's a few different plot strands, all revolving around people trying to find a partner and/or a fortune, but the two main ones follow two women looking for husbands based on very different criteria. Sophie Stanton plays the titular Mrs Rich, widow of a banker and, in a bit of character naming that's painfully on-the-nose even by Restoration comedy standards, she's very rich. But in 1700 as in 2018 banking isn't the most beloved of professions, so the way she got her money means the society ladies she wants to mingle with look down on her.

Theatre review: The Roaring Girl

The show that gives this year's RSC Swan season its overall title is Dekker and Middleton's The Roaring Girl, a comedy inspired by a real-life Jacobean woman nicknamed Moll Cutpurse, whose fondness for dressing in men's clothes, drinking in taverns and starting fights made her notorious. Jo Davies transfers the fictional Moll to the 1890s, and a Victorian London obsessed with sex, but uncomfortable with any kind of gender-bending. So when Sir Alexander Wengrave (David Rintoul) disapproves of his son marrying Mary (Faye Castelow) because her dowry isn't big enough, Sebastian (Joe Bannister) has a plan: Pretend to be in love with Moll Cutpurse, and his father will be so horrified that Mary seems the perfect daughter-in-law in comparison. One slight problem with the plan is that Moll (Lisa Dillon) doesn't actually know about it, and may not want to cooperate.

Theatre review: Carousel

I'm going to take a wild stab in the dark and say Rodgers & Hammerstein weren't feminists. After a rather unfortunate experience with South Pacific I'm not sure what took me back to the Barbican a year later for more of their back catalogue, this time Carousel in a production by Opera North. This is one of Rodgers & Hammerstein's more regularly revived musicals, and the production has had some glowing reviews, but it won't be getting one from me. Julie Jordan (Gillene Herbert or Katherine Manley - multiple performers are listed on the website and the Barbican had no notice board up to say who was performing tonight) is a female lead (I'd tell you more about her character if she had one) who falls for Billy Bigelow (Eric Greene or Michael Todd Simpson.) He's just been fired from his job at a carnival carousel but they get married regardless, and within weeks he's smacking her about - in what I'm sure is meant as some kind of running joke, Billy keeps complaining that people have got him wrong: "I didn't beat her, I hit her."