All’s well but oft expectation fails, and most oft there where most it promises

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What: All’s Well That Ends Well

Where: Royal Shakespeare Theatre, Stratford-Upon-Avon

When: 1st August 2013

Last time out for me, with the Royal Shakespeare Company, was to see their outstanding, remarkable and bloody production of Titus Andronicus in the Swan Theatre. This time I’m in the main Royal Shakespeare Theatre watching a solid but not quite as remarkable version of All’s Well That Ends Well.

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…..Unless the gods delight in tragedies……

What: Titus Andronicus

Where: Swan Theatre, Stratford-Upon-Avon

When: 30th May 2013

Perhaps, before I begin this review, I have to make a confession, Titus Andronicus is one of my favourite plays in Shakespeare’s oeuvre. Whilst other reviewers see it as being out of step with contemporary tastes, I have written quite extensively about its resonance with contemporary mores and issues. So whilst others were surprised to see it included in the RSC’s current season, I was pleased and excited to see it there. And I have to say that this production did not disappoint but lived up to all my hopes and expectations.

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Thou shall not choose but go

When: 26th July 2012

Where: Royal Shakespeare Theatre, Stratford-Upon-Avon

What: Twelfth Night by William Shakespeare

When considering the RSC’s current production of “Twelfth Night”, it is helpful to separate out the plays two strands: the humorous and the romantic.

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“What Masques, What Dances Shall We Have, to wear away this long age of three hours?

What: A Midsummer Night’s Dream
Where: Stratford-Upon-Avon
When: 4th of August 2011

This is the third play that the Royal Shakespeare Company have performed from the Shakespearean canon since the launch of their new theatre – and to say that I did not approach the grim exterior of that new theatre with much enthusiasm would have been something of an understatement.

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