Shakespeare meets the noughties in this Friends-inspired adaptation of Much Ado About Nothing. A reduced cast and script don’t mean less in this case, with lots of laughs in the Bard’s sitcom.Summary
Rating
Good!
Tagged right at the end of the Camden Fringe is a new version of Shakespeare’s Much Ado About Nothing. Adding to a long, long list of adaptations, The Constellation Players give it quite a whimsical makeover by taking influence from nineties to noughties influential sitcom Friends. Something about walking through the busy Central London to the Bridewell Theatre makes this choice feel right, like I could have been charging through Manhattan to go to my local coffee shop to see my friends there. At least it might seem that way if I squint and pretend it’s 2002…
Honestly, in a usual way that humour changes over time, I wasn’t sure that Friends had aged well. But with the framework of Much Ado and the kind of enduring quality that Shakespeare’s humour has, this influence works well. The larger cast of the older play has been reduced to six, the same number as the sitcom’s core ensemble. We are left with the two main couples of Beatrice (Saskia Mollard) and Benedick (Timothy Dennett), and Hero (Jamie Wigley) and Claudio (Ronan Quinou), alongside matchmaker Don Pedro (Sam Nafisi) and Hero’s women-in-waiting Margaret and Ursula (both played by Mary Jensik). It seemed that loosely they assigned each character a Friends equivalent to emulate, although it took me a while to figure out who the homages to Ross and Chandler.
What this version of Much Ado and Friends has in common is the six young adults, full of fun, exploring will-they-won’t-they relationships with humour. I think this is why this choice in adaptation is a great one. The Friends-style humour that’s a bit slapstick, nearly too silly, and consistently good-natured fits just right in this play’s context. Losing a lot of characters and a decent chunk of lines (today’s performance was just over an hour) doesn’t leave this version wanting. In fact, it is a nice reminder that complex presentations of Shakespearean narratives often have a simple and engaging core.
The simplified story and lively direction by Madison Cole carry the performance well this evening. At times, the cast seems to rely on the heavily Friends-esque moments, which are done well, but the moments in between feel glossed over. A few lines felt rushed, to get to the crucial funny bit, and some of the characters were only fully embodied at these key moments.
It is still an enjoyable performance, with a nostalgic feel and a clear identity. Some great music choices take us bang into the right decade, and there are nice touches in costume which hark back to the sitcom. This version of Much Ado About Nothing might be reduced, but it is not lacking.
Written by William Shakespeare
Directed by Madison Cole
Produced by Mary Jensik
Much Ado About Nothing has finished its run at the Bridewell Theatre
