There is no character in RICHARD III whose stature is in any way comparable with that of Richard himself. This is proved mightily in the Genesian’s current production.
Helmer Gary Dooley has nailed the primary responsibility of a director in casting Roger Gimblett as the misshapen Dick, Shakespeare’s “poisonous bunchback’d toad”.
An accomplished actor and director, Gimblett embodies the malevolent Machiavellian monster imbuing him with a charlatan charm, intelligence, wit and love of wordplay.
In so much as Richard is an “actor” himself – strutting the stage as loving brother, reluctant monarch, honey-worded wooer – Gimblett’s experience and technique shines through his portrayal, robustly hurdling the moral steeples at full stride, gleefully relishing his audience asides.
Such a consummate turn, however, serves to show the shortcomings of the supporting cast who, for the most part, struggle with the language and stagecraft.
The females fare best with Hailey McQueen as a feisty Lady Anne, spirited spitfire who finally succumbs to the seduction by the “bottled spider” and Elizabeth McGregor, portraying a palpable stoicism as Queen Elizabeth, “queen of sad mischance”.
Of the males, Dominic McDonald, acquits himself with a louche rendering of Buckingham, the hunchback’s henchman.
The Genesian’s Kent Street stage is pared back to its sandstone wall and stained glass windows to good effect and Tim Carter’s “stained glass” lighting supplies a sympathetic symmetry.
Sadly, director Dooley’s staging is stolid and stodgy and has a glaring misstep in the introduction of bizarre alien-shaped puppets appallingly puppeteered by minion cast members – a jarring adjunct that elicited barely contained sniggers.
Their reappearance centre stage in the dream sequence, in which all Richard’s victims pass blessings to Richmond and curses to Richard, dissipates the drama of the villain’s coward conscience catching up with him. It is perplexing that these upstaging puppets are not placed with the flesh and blood performers who appear phantom like behind venetian blinds.
Dooley’s opening and closing choice of music –‘Jerusalem’ to begin and ‘We’ll Meet Again’ to finish- is simpatico with Shakespeare’s dramatic irony. However, the visual and physical cut and thrust of the play is not as rigorously realised. For example, his choice of having the whore Shore present at Hasting’s arrest is an interesting one, but not capitalised upon. What could have been a fiery confluence of illicit sex and counterfeit confederacy in the sulphuric sphere of witchcraft is, in this staging, dramatically inept . . . as limp as Richard’s gait.
Gary Dooley’s production of RICHARD 111 opened at Genesian Theatre, 420 Kent Street, Sydney on Saturday 9th March and runs until Saturday 20th April, 2013.
© Richard Cotter
11th March, 2013
Tags: Sydney Stage Reviews- RICHARD 111, William Shakespeare, Genesian Theatre Company, Gary Dooley, Roger Gimblett, Hayley McQueen, Elizabeth McGregor, Dominic McDonald, Sydney Arts Guide, Richard Cotter
