Shakespeare
Macbeth
★★★★☆ High impact
There’s plenty to mull over in the high concept, high impact, high-everything modern dress production of Macbeth touring to a quartet of created theatre spaces – and this month spending a fortnight at the Royal Highland Centre.
Matthew Bourne’s Romeo and Juliet
★★★★☆ Radical and inventive
Matthew Bourne’s radical reinterpretation of Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet for his New Adventures company, creates a ballet about the powerless and the powerful which highlights the madness of young love and the crazy things it forces us to do.
Julius Caesar Must Die
★★★★☆ Committed
Myths Unbound and New Celts charge through Julius Caesar Must Die at theSpace on the Mile with fire and real purpose.
The Real William Shakespeare… As Told by Christopher Marlowe
★★★★☆ Full of imagination
There are many debates and conspiracy theories surrounding Shakespeare’s life and work. The Real William Shakespeare… as Told by Christopher Marlowe, from Matchmaker Theatre Productions, pitches into one of those thought-provoking theories with great humour, music and lively performances.
Hamlet / Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead by Tom Stoppard
★★★☆☆ Pacy and ★★★★☆ Slick
New Edinburgh amateur company Necessary Cat make their debut performances for the last week only of the fringe with the elegantly twinned pairing of Shakespeare’s Hamlet and Tom Stoppard’s Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead.
Shakespeare For Breakfast / Shakespeare Up Late: A Right Royal Visit
★★★☆☆ Charming and ★★★☆☆ Chaotic
C Theatre have two contrasting reworkings of the Bard in Shakespeare for Breakfast at C aurora and Shakespeare Up Late – A Right Royal Visit at C aquila. While there are differences in tone and intent between the two productions, they are not as marked as might be imagined.
A Midsummer Night’s Dream
★★★★☆ Accomplished
In a wood, a league without the Old Town, the players of the Forth Act have set out their stall in an accomplished and highly entertaining al-fresco production of Shakespeare’s great comedy, A Midsummer Night’s Dream.
Al Fresco Midsummer Night’s Dream
The Forth Act to stage Shakespeare’s Dream in Saughton Park
This midsummer, new Edinburgh grass-roots theatre company, The Forth Act, is set to perform Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream in the open air arena of the Italian Garden in Saughton Park.
The Taming of the Shrew
★★★☆☆ Suspiciously old-fashioned
The Edinburgh Makars’ production of Shakespeare’s The Taming of the Shrew, at the Church Hill until Friday, is an apparently traditional version of the play which may well be more quietly subversive than many modern revisions.
Julius Caesar
★★★☆☆ Uneven
Edinburgh University Shakespeare Company’s Julius Caesar, in the Teviot Debating Hall, is as unpredictable as it is ambitious. It is by turn sublime and ridiculous, well thought out at times and inexplicable at others.
