I, Claudius
★★★★☆ Epic
The Royal Scots Club (Venue 241): Mon 17 – Sat 22 Aug 2026
Review by Rebecca Mahar
Local company Strawmoddie, known for their series of Terry Pratchett stage adaptations, take on ancient Rome in an ambitious two-part production of I, Claudius, bringing the 1976 television series to the stage for the first time in this limited world-premiere run.
The adaptation is penned by Strawmoddie Artistic Director Jonathan Whiteside, who directs alongside Caitlin Carter. It seeks to distil Jack Pullman’s thirteen-hour series – itself an adaptation of Robert Graves’ novels I, Claudius and its sequel, Claudius the God – into four and a half hours of theatre.
A scene from I, Claudius Part One. Pic: Andrew Morris.
In such a daunting undertaking, plot points and characters are naturally shed along the way, but for the most part Whiteside has done an admirable job of maintaining a narrative through line and interest. The play’s presentation in two parts allows for viewing on subsequent evenings, or for a true one-night double-bill to get the whole story all in one go.
Splitting the script is in the tradition of other extended stories such as Henry IV in Shakespeare’s canon, but in the case of I, Claudius, both parts really do comprise a single play, and are essential viewing.
The play opens with Claudius (Timothy Bond) at his desk, writing. Turning to the audience he introduces himself, declaring that he is “about the begin the strange history of [his] life,” which will stay hidden for 2000 years, before Claudius shall speak clear.
vulnerability and safety
Claudius wrote extensively, although none of his works survive – including a known autobiography. It is this autobiography that the Claudius of the play as writing and which provides the play’s guide through the tumultuous story of his life.
Historically, Claudius occupied a unique position of both vulnerability and safety within the Roman Julio-Claudian dynasty due to his physical disabilities and speech impediment. He would survive murders and purges through each of the emperors’ reigns before him, until he was, himself crowned and became the fourth emperor of Rome.
A scene from I, Claudius Part One. Pic: Andrew Morris.
Claudius’s history begins in the reign of Augustus (Ben Blow), first emperor of Rome in the midst of the Pax Romana. He is married to Livia (Lucy Hagan-Walker), the principal antagonist of Part One of the play. She is his second wife and brought her two sons Tiberius (Alan Sunter) and Drusus (Robbie Morris), into their marriage.
Of her sons, Livia favours Tiberius, married to the daughter of Augustus’s second in command, Agrippa (Angelo Tata), while Drusus is married to Augustus’s niece, Antonia (Hilary Davies). Livia has ambitions to elevate Tiberius to the throne after Augustus, so encourages him to divorce his wife in favour of his stepsister Julia (Morven Hawthorne); whose husband has suddenly and mysteriously died.
Drusus, disliked by his mother, is sent away to front line conflict, where he dies while under the care of Livia’s personal physician – but not before Antonia his given birth to their son, the baby Claudius.
machinations
This is the smallest sampling of Livia’s machinations in the ruthless game of chess that is her ambition and desire for power and control. Part One begins in 23 BCE, seven years after the deaths of Mark Antony and Cleopatra, and continues through to Livia’s death in 29 CE, during which time numerous murders are committed and marriages broken and made, until at last Tiberius ascends the throne after the death of Augustus. Claudius, whom Livia considers to be a fool and no threat, manages to escape all harm by playing into her expectations.
A scene from I, Claudius Part One. Pic: Andrew Morris.
Hagan-Walker is a marvellous Livia, sharp and biting, with perfect delivery of the many cutting remarks and dry witticisms Whiteside’s script offers her. There is no softness or redemption to Livia, her guard up at every moment except her final few, where she begs to be made a goddess to avoid the torments of hell for her many evil deeds. Although the play is viewed through Claudius’s eyes, Livia is truly the glue which holds the first part together, and Hagan-Walker more than rises to the challenge.
Ben Blow is a brilliant Augustus, though he does have a tendency to bellow more often than is strictly necessary, reducing the impact of the choice and leaving the audience’s ears ringing. Alan Sunter’s Tiberius is one with a true arc, descending from happily married man without particular ambitions to the throne, to miserable and twisted tyrant.
directed with skill
As a whole, the piece is very well cast and directed with skill, each of the many characters are distinct and individually formed. Its major challenges come in two forms: the aging (or lack thereof) of certain characters over the course of one or both parts, and the sheer volume of characters.
Hagan-Walker and Sunter periodically add grey to their Livia and Tiberius’s hair during Part One to indicate the passage of time (itself achieved by frequent time skips referenced in the dialogue), but Augustus and Julia, for instance, maintain the same appearance throughout, as does Claudius.
A scene from I, Claudius Part One. Pic: Andrew Morris.
Antonia’s appearance also remains the same, and this is perhaps one instance of questionable casting. Although Davies is excellent in the role, she begins the play pregnant with Claudius and married to Drusus, who is twenty-nine when he dies, and is played by the age-appropriate Morris. Davies could easily play the mother or grandmother of the then 27 year-old Antonia. The timeline catches up with her in Part Two, but it is an unfair case of younger actors being able to age themselves up with makeup and hair colour, where the reverse is not so easily achievable.
It is more or less possible to follow the relationships and names of the characters in Part One, but in Part Two, where things really start to heat up and emperors to rotate, this becomes much more difficult.
I, Claudius is performed by a nineteen-strong cast playing sixty-four named characters, some actors play up to nine characters each. The programme has, in addition to the cast list, helpfully included a family tree. Together, these are essential materials for following the story and, at certain points, having any idea who some of these people are.
Clarity
Clarity is not helped by the mixing of which parts of names in the complex Roman naming system are used to refer to certain characters in the dialogue versus the cast list. This is a place where certain fudging of historicity (such as the inclusion of “Germany,” “Spanish,” and “ballet,”) might have come in handy to simplify things for the audience’s sake.
There are also still characters whom, despite the already mammoth abridgement project that has been undertaken, could have been jettisoned without any impact on the narrative, such as Apicata who appears with no context for a single scene and is never heard from again.
A scene from I, Claudius Part Two. Pic: Andrew Morris.
Part Two begins in the reign of Tiberius who, without Livia’s influence, has become a despot and removed himself to Capri, leaving daily administration of the empire to the prefect Sejanus (Matthew Jeb).
The play rips through a series of love affairs, marriages, and murders: Claudius’s sister Livilla (Jenna Donoghue) who is married to their cousin Castor has an affair with Sejanus; when Sejanus is killed Antonia locks Livilla in her room to starve to death and Claudius, who has been married to Sejanus’s sister Aelia (Morven Hawthorne), divorces her to marry the youthful Messalina (also Donoghue), who is introduced without context.
Meanwhile, Tiberius is murdered by Sejanus’s replacement, Macro (James Cruickshank) at the behest of Caligula (Caitlin Carter), Claudius’s nephew, who then becomes emperor and marries his own sister Drusilla (Amèlie Berry). The dangerous and unstable Caligula is assassinated and in the power vacuum that follows, the praetorian guard proclaim the reluctant Claudius (now with some grey at his temples) to be emperor.
executions
At the outset things seem to be going well for Claudius, but Messalina, after having two children, is openly adulterous, even entering into – and winning – a contest with Scylla (Sarah Stanton), a famous prostitute, to see who can “wear out” the most men. Eventually she bigamously marries the senator Silius (Robbie Morris) while Claudius is away, resulting in both of their executions— though Claudius is tricked into signing Messalina’s death warrant.
A scene from I, Claudius Part Two. Pic: Andrew Morris.
Seeing the degeneration of the Julio-Claudian dynasty at work, Claudius agrees to marry his scheming niece Agrippinilla (Sarah Stanton) who brings with her a child from her previous marriage, Nero (also Cruickshank), in order to hasten imperial downfall and the hopeful return of the republic.
Presumably opening in 29 CE shortly after the death of Livia (though Claudius’s opening narration covers a fair amount of time) and ending in 54 CE at Claudius’s death, the second part covers another twenty-five years, for a total of seventy-seven years encompassed by the full production. The sheer mass of events covered in Part Two amplifies the feeling that arises periodically throughout of the play as a rapid series of vignettes that, despite the exemplary efforts of the actors, don’t always allow for a full exploration of character.
The continuity of Timothy Bond as Claudius holds it all together, carrying the through-line of observation and the weight of understanding that does, in the end, make it his play. In further development of this script, there could well be scope for more time to be spent with Claudius the narrator, while further trimming in other areas.
vulnerability
Carter as Caligula and Berry as Drusilla are standouts in Part Two, with Carter embodying the progressively madder and madder, doomed emperor with detail and just enough vulnerability to make him sickly sympathetic. Similarly, Berry’s Drusilla seems flippant and unserious, but at key points her sharpness and self-preservation, ultimately futile, flash through, sharply executed by Berry. Stanton shines in each of her roles, Scylla a particular highlight and contrast to the Lavinia-like Agrippinilla.
A scene from I, Claudius Part One. Pic: Andrew Morris.
The production values of I, Claudius are a cut above the usual Fringe expectations, with Whiteside, Carter, Freya Ledinghan, and Kathryn Howard all contributing to the extensive costuming demands of such an enormous slate of characters.
Dug Campbell contributes sound design and composes an original score, bringing aural drama to the world of the play without being overbearing, and lending the feel of a television serial to the live proceedings.
truly epic in scale
A selection of live modern songs, thoroughly anachronistic and yet somehow not seeming out of place, are performed periodically by Ray Finlayson as the imperial household Singer, who accompanies himself on the lyre.
I, Claudius is an incredible idea to take on, particularly for a grassroots company. Strawmoddie have attempted and achieved something truly epic in scale, demonstrating that it can be done, and showcasing the huge number of skilled actors and creatives of every theatrical stripe who are living and working in and near Edinburgh.
I, Claudius: Part 1
Running time: Two hours and 15 minutes (including a 5 minute pause).
The Royal Scots Club (Hepburn Suite), 29-31 Abercromby Place EH3 6QE (Venue 241).
Monday 17 – Saturday 22 August 2026.
Daily (Not Tue 18): 6.15pm.
Tickets and details: Book here at EdFringe.com.
I, Claudius: Part 2
Running time: Two hours and 15 minutes (including a 5 minute pause).
The Royal Scots Club (Hepburn Suite), 29-31 Abercromby Place EH3 6QE (Venue 241).
Tuesday 18 – Saturday 22 August 2026.
Tue: 6.15pm; Wed – Sat: 8.45pm.
Tickets and details: Book here at EdFringe.com.
Strawmoddie website: www.strawmoddietheatre.company
Facebook: @strawmoddie
Instagram: @strawmoddie.
Cast Portrait: I, Claudius. Including those mentioned in the review as well as David Taylor, Sinclair Davis and Dario Dalla Costa. Pic: Strawmoddie.
ENDS
