★★★✰✰
Wildcard Theatre Company bring their signature music infused vivacity to a new version of Shakespeare’s The Tempest. Whilst the individual elements are delicately crafted and rigorously executed, they never quite add up to the sum of their parts making for a somewhat incoherent but still enjoyable version of Shakespeare’s problem play.
Set Designer Luke W. Robson turns Prospero’s Island into a rave den, somewhere between Peter Pan and The Hacienda. Glow in the dark paint that glistens under UV lights stains the walls. Characters are flamboyantly dressed as if they have just arrived from Coachella, with extravagant coats, stripey suits, and face paint.
It is the perfect backdrop for Jasmine Morris’s score, an eclectic mix of electronica, drum and bass, power ballads, and guitar serenades. Performers multirole, stepping in and out of performing on stage as their characters, and retreating upstage to join the band. The live music breathes organic emotional fluidity into the production, masterfully guiding the audience through each narrative beat. This is strongest when the music is simple; a solitary violin weeping accompanying one of Kate Littlewood’s melancholic monologues as Prospero, not when the production goes on an assault of the senses with booming bass and strobe lighting to manifest Ariel’s magic powers.
The production stumbles when it jumps between tonal shifts. Gigi Zahir’s fourth wall shattering Drag Queen take on Trinculo steals the show with their intoxicating charisma, Yayoi Kusama style wig, and cowboy boots to match. Paired with Eleanor House’s bombastic trombone wielding Stephano, the two inject the play with crude innuendo and cabaret style banter and bounce off Alexander Bean’s straight—edged Caliban. Yet this clashes the with the serious moments in the play. The relationship between Tashinga Bepete’s guitar strumming soft-boy Ferdinand and Ruby Crepin—Glyne’s vibrant Miranda could never quite blossom as a result of the tonal clunkiness. They shared some moments of affection which were buttressed by the live music, but just missed out on creating a sense of genuine romantic warmth between them.
The Tempest is never more than the sum of its parts. The ingredients are there to make their version of The Tempest a sexy and anarchic take on one of Shakespeare’s final plays, but the final product underdelivered despite its wit and boundless energy. Whilst lacking a concrete vision, their take on The Tempest is an undeniably charming production, brimming with flare and a colourful cast of characters.
Words by Alexander Cohen
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