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A CurtainUp London London Review
A Midsummer Night's Dream from Footsbarn



Lord, what fools these mortals be! — Puck
 A Midsummer Night's Dream from Footsbarn
Akemi Yamauchi as Titania and Patrick Hayter as Bottom
(Photo: Footsbarn)
For the first time in seventeen years this summer the Footsbarn Travelling Theatre returned to London to mount a production at Shakespeare's Globe. Those five performances sold out as word spread about the Cornish founded company, which came into being almost forty years ago. Their approach to theatre is to win new audiences whilst at the same time harking back to the theatre of myths and legend, masks and mumming. Dominic Dromgoole summed up Footsbarn saying, "They are genuinely bananas - that's why I love them so much." The Footsbarn cast live and travel in their beautifully painted caravans and lorries and some are second generation with the company. Their performances are as much a festival as a staged play. Now based in France with many French participants, the company is as well known in Europe as in the UK performing in English or in French or sometimes in five different languages. This month sees them in a cosy and waterproof tent in Victoria Park for a vibrant and involving, if somewhat unseasonal production of A Midsummer Night's Dream.

Theseus and Hippolyta talk to us and each other from Hindu type gauze tents like a Marharajah and his Maharani, unseen but clear of voice. The first surprise is the relative age of the lovers, Demetrius (Vincent Gracieux) and Lysander (Patrick Hayter doubling as Bottom) are not in the first flush of youth. Demetrius has a rust coloured wig and bright rouged cheeks and pale make-up and Lysander sports beautiful long blonde ringlets, red lipstick and neither of them will probably see 60 again! I liked the ridiculous age of the lovers emphasising that they are not just fools but old fools. If the Dream's lovers are about infatuation then the more ridiculous the better! The cast mercilessly lampoon latecomers and crying children, Helena (Muriel Picquart) fixes with her quizzical stare, the children some of whom were a little small to sit for two hours without erupting.

There is music throughout from two musicians on a variety of exotic instruments including something like a marenga. The mechanicals are hessian and straw eating yokels, country folk with their brains addled by drinking rough cider, expert clowns. These humans contrast with the otherworldly fairies in masks led by Titania (Akemi Yamauchi) whose grace of movement enchants. Joseph Cunningham doubles as a mysterious Oberon and Flute in an interesting pairing. Titania entertains Bottom, who has a huge asses head, in a giant orange lily bowery. When the court gathers at the end they hold ten foot high poles with bird like masks and feathered capes to improvise and free up the actors for their doubled roles. The costumes and masks are wildly imaginative, small works of art with creepers and natural fabrics adding to the magic of the fairy dance finale.

We came away from Footsbarn's Dream feeling light hearted and refreshed with a sense of the joyous entertainment this play has been giving people for four hundred years.

A Midsummer Night's Dream from Footsbarn
Written by William Shakespeare
Directed by Patrick Hayter

With: Vincent Gracieux, Muriel Piquart, Mas Soegeng, Akemi Yamauchi, Caroline Piette, Julie Biereye, Anne de Broca
Musicians: Pawel Paluch, Chandran.
Sets, Masks and Props: Fredericka Hayter
Costumes: Hanna Sjodin
Sound and Lighting: Bruno Hocquard
Lights: Michael Serejnikof
Film projection, props: Sophie Lascelles
Running time: Two hours without an interval
Box Office: 020 3355 6727
Website: www.footsbarn.com
Booking to 30th November 2008
Reviewed by Lizzie Loveridge based on 9th November 2008 performance at the Footsbarn Tent, Victoria Park, London E9 (Nearest Tube: Bethnal Green plus a walk)
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