The Merry Wives of Windsor: Royal Shakespeare Company - Review

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Mon 10 Jun 2024 - Sat 07 Sep 2024

Shakespeare's scheming wives in this frothy comedy are transported to modern-day middle-class England yet this zesty production feels anything but suburban. This new Royal Shakespeare Company(RSC) version is so contemporary, that there's even the England football team's campaign in the Euros as an underlying theme.

It's true to form for director Blanche McIntyre whose productions for the RSC have been making Shakespeare's age-old stories feel thoroughly modern for today's audiences. Her Titus Andronicus had a Quentin Tarantino feel and the 2022 All's Well That Ends Well put the Instagram generation at the centre of the plot.

This time McIntyre has adapted The Merry Wives of Windsor as the big Summer draw to Stratford-upon-Avon's Royal Shakespeare Theatre. It runs there until September 7.

The story unfolds like a sitcom in small-town England with two giggling female friends as they get revenge on rascal Sir John Falstaff, who has sent them both identical love letters to woo them for money. Samantha Spiro and Siubhan Harrison, as Mistresses Meg and Alice Ford respectively and shown below, are best pals and a cliche of the middle classes. They go wild swimming and down gin and tonics in a rather lush living room like something straight out of BBC show Birds Of A Feather.



While they are preoccupied with embarrassing Falstaff, Meg's daughter, pictured top of the page, is fending off suitors from her parents to make her own love match in a light and breezy subplot involving the savvy and welcome addition of Mistress Quickly, played by a gregarious Shazia Nicholls

There's a rotating stage that moves between their homes, the park where cyclists ride and the local Garter pub preparing for the England football matches.

While the fine female leads make easy work of Shakespeare's prose, as entertaining and slick as they are, the pair are outshone at every turn by John Hodgkinson as a cheeky Falstaff. He's perfectly cast and leans heavily on the comedy elements of this buffoonish chancer with a glint in his eye.

Hodgkinson's Falstaff, pictured below, is the sort of man who makes a woman squeeze past his huge belly in a tight doorway while giving her and the audience a lewd smile. Or gulps down two pints in quick succession - another crowd-pleaser. He's simply a joy from start to finish.



That's despite a rather slow, stilted start to the production. The action finally builds momentum after about half an hour and then speeds through to a riotous finish that brings howls of laughter. Never more so than when Falstaff is throwing himself headfirst into a laundry basket or escaping from a jealous husband in women's clothes. Just the way he walks in heels has the audience in stitches.

Falstaff is even given the final moments on stage at the close of the play, despite not having the last line. He's left alone before Hodgkinson gives a finely-tuned shrug to the audience for a satisfying finish.

This Merry Wives is well-themed too, to tie in with the Euro Championships this Summer. Falstaff's lackeys wear England football shirts and have commandeered a pub garden picnic table, where they later dupe the landlady in a con involving visiting German football fans.

Even after the interval, they encourage the audience to sing the anthem 'Sweet Caroline.' The clever adaptation all fits in seamlessly.




It's not just Falstaff's portrayal that has great comedy depth, but also jealous husband Frank Ford. Actor Richard Goulding, shown standing above with Hodgkinson, gives him wonderfully obsessive and strangely mumbling traits as Frank goes more crazed as he goes undercover to catch his wife out.

Interestingly, Sir Hugh Evans is a Welsh parson(played by Ian Hughes)and Dr Caius is a French dentist(Jason Thorpe) and the comedy around them is heavily based on their accents and mispronunciations. Using these stereotypes made me think of another BBC sitcom of 'Allo 'Allo back in the 1980s. While sometimes funny, I've seen this type of thing in a few recent RSC shows of late and it feels a bit repetitive and dated.

It's in the final scenes that the suburban homes disappear and are replaced by a glorious huge ancient tree for Falstaff's comeuppance. In the dead of night, the shadows of its branches reflect beautifully from the moonlight across the stage. The detail is spot on and there's even a plastic bag and pair of trainers caught at the top.

The Merry Wives of Windsor is a fresh, fun and lively new take from the RSC that is guaranteed to make you laugh. This exciting adaptation fits in perfectly with the Summer of Sport and has a winning cast that makes it a comedy surefire hit.

RATING: 4 out of 5 stars


Visit the The Merry Wives Of Windsor RSC website here for tickets. It runs at Stratford-upon-Avon's Royal Shakespeare Theatre until September 7.

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