This week, I was thrilled to be at the RSC for the Blog
Titus event, and sat mesmerised as the players wove a blood-spattered tale from
threads of revenge, duty, honour, terrorism, and - fascinatingly – high humour amidst
hellish brutality. Afterwards at the Q&A, the genial, intelligent director
Michael Fentiman talked easily about the development of the play. Though Titus
was enormously popular in Shakespeare’s day - “a hit”, as he called it - it gradually
fell out of favour, reaching a nadir in the Victorian era when it was rarely performed;
and, to add insult to injury, for years the authorship and quality of writing were
called into question, with some notable critics casting Titus out of the
Shakespeare canon altogether. With the unprecedented brutality of the 20th
century, however, Titus Andronicus became more accepted as it became more
relevant. Key in this was the post war Olivier production of 1955, which
reinstated the play among the first order of Shakespeare tragedies. In the
midst of our 21st century wars on terror Titus now seems current, authoritative. As Fentiman observed, every play has its day,
and Titus, once so denigrated, now reads like a landmark movie script.
The actress Katy Stephens talked incisively about her role
as the captive Goth queen Tamora, suggesting that her cruel manoeuvrings were actually
carefully plotted acts of resistance against her captors. At the beginning of
the play, the victorious Titus Andronicus sacrifices Tamora’s eldest son, in
spite of her pleas for clemency – an act reflected later in his own daughter Lavinia’s desperate pleas for Tamora to
put a stop to her impending rape. Tamora famously refuses and gives the
go-ahead for her sons to proceed with the assault. This is revenge served cold
– an act so shocking and politicised that Stephens characterised it as an act
of terror. Chillingly, she conjectured that Tamora may also have been raped –
possibly by Titus himself. As I listened
to the actress speak, I was doubly impressed with Shakespeare’s vision and
humanity. Every year, untold numbers of women endure rape as an act of terror
and revenge, but little is done to redress this. Through the disfigured,
bloodied, Lavinia, and the radicalised, hate-filled Tamora, Shakespeare forces
us to confront these issues head on. Here is a very modern morality play.
Titus’ daughter, Lavinia, is a difficult role to play, but
Rose Reynolds performance powerfully captured the transformation from beautiful
patrician virgin to dismembered, traumatised, wreck. In a wonderful insight
into the acting process, Reynolds spoke last night about the techniques she
used to portray the horror of her butchery – including lying on the ground and
raising her straight legs above her shoulders so that the muscles spasmed, and
she shook involuntarily. She used this muscle memory, shaking coldly throughout
much of the performance. Reynolds also described a friend who had lost a finger,
who experienced pain whenever she lowered her arm. Lavinia thus kept her hands
raised when discovered by her uncle, Marcus – a posture so ugly, so awkward
that it conveyed the roaring pain in her bloodied stumps.
When asked what he thought were the lessons of the play, the
Director, Michael Fentiman, mentioned the dehumanising effects of war,
particularly on Titus Andronicus himself. Stephen Boxer, who played Titus with wit
and depth, reflected upon the man, whose return to Rome – and expected retirement
- exacerbated the brutalities of Roman politics. Boxer discussed how the
escalation of his woes led eventually to his breakdown and transformation. When
asked why he laughed in the most appalling of circumstances, Titus replies that
he has no more tears to cry. Once Titus passes through this breaking point into
something resembling madness, Stephen Boxer plays with the text to great comic
effect. At one point he raised the plastic bags holding the heads of his sons,
to listen to what they were saying. Explaining this grotesquery, Boxer smiled
and said, “it is actually there in the text”. And yes, I suppose it is. With
such humour, you are reminded of cinematic portrayals of walking wounded from
20th century wars, carrying their own limbs, laughing. Hell must be full
of laughter.
Not there for the Q and A sessions, unfortunately, was the
wonderful Kevin Harvey, who played Aaron with authority and wit, suggesting again
that his were acts of resistance, rather than evil. His Liverpudlian accent
worked well in marking his difference from the patrician Rome in which he found
himself.
Richard Durden was a masterful Marcus – genial, wise,
realistic, disappointed. His key moment came on discovering the mutilated
Lavinia. Marcus’ speech has frequently been cut, as many modern directors and
critics found it flowery and inappropriate. As Director Michael Fentiman
explained, however, the passage was kept in as the burbling mutterings of a man
presented with something so shocking that no words are adequate. With the
bloodied Lavinia at the front of the stage, staring incomprehendingly out at
the audience, Marcus stood way behind her- one was thus transfixed by the
trembling Lavinia, as the balmy words flowed over her.
Mention must also go to Ben Deery, who stepped into the role
of the Emperor, Saturninus for the night, in a well judged, balanced, and at
times hilarious performance. Perry Millward and Jonny Weldon were terrific as
Tamora’s terrifying sons, Demetrius and Chiron – played with verve and gusto,
rather like a demonic Ant and Dec. The appearance of them lurking on BMX bikes
was a dark, threatening touch.
Shocking? Yes. Brutal? Yes. But so is life out there in the
real world. As Stephen Boxer concluded, Shakespeare, as always, holds a mirror
up to us. And this time, in 2013, the vision is terrifying.
My thanks to Dean Asker and Amy Belson for organising this
Blog event, and thanks to the Director and actors for giving such an
interesting insight into the production of this unsettling play.
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