The Upcoming
  • Culture
    • Art
    • Cinema
      • Movie reviews
      • Film festivals
    • Food & Drinks
      • News & Features
      • Restaurant & bar reviews
      • Interviews & Recipes
    • Literature
    • Music
      • Live music
    • Theatre
    • Shows & On demand
  • Fashion & Lifestyle
    • Accessories
    • Beauty
    • News & Features
    • Shopping & Trends
    • Tips & How-tos
    • Fashion weeks
  • What’s On
    • Art exhibitions
    • Theatre shows
  • Tickets
  • Join us
    • Editorial unit
    • Our writers
    • Join the team
    • Join the mailing list
    • Fund us
    • Contact us
  • Interviews
  • Competitions
  • Special events
    • Film festivals
      • Berlin
      • Tribeca
      • Sundance London
      • Cannes
      • Locarno
      • Venice
      • London
      • Toronto
    • Fashion weeks
      • London Fashion Week
      • New York Fashion Week
      • Milan Fashion Week
      • Paris Fashion Week
      • Haute Couture
      • London Fashion Week Men’s
  • Facebook

  • Twitter

  • Instagram

  • YouTube

  • Tumblr

  • RSS


CultureTheatre

Titus Andronicus at the Barbican

Titus Andronicus at the Barbican | Theatre review
15 December 2017
Juliet Evans
Avatar
Juliet Evans
15 December 2017

Theatre review

Juliet Evans

Titus Andronicus

★★★★★

Dates

7th December 2017 - 19th January 2018

Price

£10-£75

Links & directions

TwitterWebsiteMap

The extreme gore of Titus Andronicus, not the best or most well-known of Shakespeare’s plays in any case, can make it hard to take seriously. The RSC’s production, transferring to London after its premiere in Stratford-upon-Avon earlier this year, negotiates the overblown violence with skill. Updated to the modern day, and fitting it astonishingly well, it is by turns comical and macabre.

The first half, in which weary general Titus (David Troughton) watches his family crumble around him, drags in places, and it’s in the second half that things really get going, as the deaths pile up in Titus’s quest for revenge. Blanche McIntyre’s production finds something relevant to our contemporary world in the scheming and sleazy politicians, and the way the personal dramas of Rome’s leading figures play out in front of an audience, both that of the imagined Roman people and the real one sitting in the theatre. The production mocks its own overblown violence at times, which is a relief, or it would quickly become too much. There are moments of the show that work less well, such as some strained audience interaction, and an overly long dance-fight opening that quickly grows stale, but it also plumbs depths of pathos and drama. There’s genuine horror here too. The scene where Titus’s daughter Lavinia (Hannah Morrish) is brutally raped is particularly hard to watch, and so is her uncle’s bumbling and unintended insensitivity when she is found mutilated, her tongue and hands cut off and her clothes around her knees. Lavinia in this modern version becomes the archetypal silenced woman, an emblem of so much more than just the violence she is personally subjected to.

The brutality of the piece feels very male – it’s driven by manipulative people, mostly men, who long for some kind of power. Aaron merely seems to revel in the chaos, and for Saturnine it’s political power that he longs for, but it’s the power over one’s enemies that revenge brings, and which Tamora and Titus long for, that really drives the violence. The ambiguous ending highlights the futility of this endless cycle, and this male-dominated play turns out as a sharp critique of stereotypical masculinity.

The cast all give excellent performances, particularly Troughton, who holds it all together through his character’s half-real, half-feigned madness, and Stefan Adegbola’s unapologetically cruel Aaron providing some excellent villainy to suit all the blood. Less successful, perhaps, is Patrick Drury’s Marcus Andronicus, by turns wooden and irritatingly over-acted. It’s rare to see as good a modern dress production as this, and despite some dull moments and occasional poor and ineffective verse speaking, the play is really made to deliver.

★★★★★

Juliet Evans
Photo: Helen Maybanks

Titus Andronicus is at the Barbican Theatre from 7th December 207 until 19th January 2018. For further information and to book visit the theatre’s website here.

Watch the trailer for Titus Andronicus here:

 

Related Itemsreview

More in Theatre

Armour

★★★★★
Selina Begum
Read More

Berberian Sound Studio at the Donmar Warehouse

★★★★★
Mersa Auda
Read More

I Want You to Admire Me / But You Shouldn’t

★★★★★
Selina Begum
Read More

Tryst

★★★★★
Selina Begum
Read More

Landscape (1989)

★★★★★
Selina Begum
Read More

All About Eve at the Noel Coward Theatre

★★★★★
Jake Cudsi
Read More

Tobacco Road

★★★★★
Daniel McLeod
Read More

The American Clock at the Old Vic

★★★★★
Connor Campbell
Read More

Edward II at the Sam Wanamaker Playhouse

★★★★★
Georgie Cowan-Turner
Read More
Scroll for more
Tap

Theatre review

Juliet Evans

Titus Andronicus

★★★★★

Dates

7th December 2017 - 19th January 2018

Price

£10-£75

Links & directions

TwitterWebsiteMap

Tickets

Theatre tickets

  • Popular

  • Latest

  • TOP PICKS

  • Babylon Beyond Borders at the Bush Theatre
    ★★★★★
    Theatre
  • Rip It Up: The 60s at Garrick Theatre
    ★★★★★
    Theatre
  • Johnstons of Elgin autumn/winter 2019 collection presentation for LFW
    Fashion weeks
  • Demons
    ★★★★★
    Berlinale
  • Happy Death Day 2U
    ★★★★★
    Movie review
  • Kalissi autumn/winter 2019 collection catwalk show for LFW
    Fashion weeks
  • UNDERAGE autumn/winter 2019 collection presentation for LFW
    Fashion weeks
  • Margaret Howell autumn/winter 2019 collection catwalk show for LFW
    Fashion weeks
  • Jeremy Loops and James Hersey at the Roundhouse
    ★★★★★
    Live music
  • A-Jane autumn/winter 2019 collection presentation for LFW
    Fashion weeks
  • Jeremy Loops and James Hersey at the Roundhouse
    ★★★★★
    Live music
  • An interview with Piranhas (La paranza dei bambini) director Claudio Giovannesi
    Berlinale
  • “I write my books and my articles to carry out my own revenge against those who try to silence me, to shut me out”: An interview with journalist and author of Piranhas (La paranza dei bambini) Roberto Saviano
    Berlinale
  • Berlin Film Festival 2019: Awards predictions and highlights from the festival
    Berlinale
  • Armour
    ★★★★★
    Theatre

Instagram

Something is wrong.
Instagram token error.
The Upcoming
Pages
  • Contact us
  • Fund us
  • Join mailing list
  • Join us
  • Our London food map
  • Our writers
  • What, when, why

Copyright © 2018 FL Media Ltd

Superfood and Bad Sounds at Dingwalls | Live review
The Jungle at the Young Vic | Theatre review