Ahead of the premiรจre of Antony and Cleopatra at Stratford, Rupert Christiansen in the Daily Telegraph pointed out that he had “never seen this play fulfilled on stage or witnessed two actors adequate to its leading roles.”
I know what he means. The last time I risked it was a couple
of decades ago ‒ a
dreary production with a schoolmarmish Cleo at the Birmingham Rep.
Well, the new production at the Swan, a joint effort of two
American companies (the Public in New York and GableStage in Miami) together
with the RSC, scores a creditable one out of two.
The Mark Antony, the well-established British actor Jonathan
Cake, really looks as though he has wandered in from a remake of Carry On Cleo.
But the Cleopatra, Joaquina Kalukango, virtually fresh from
the Juilliard School in New York, is absolutely magnificent. What a pity she
didn’t bring her own leading man.
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