Drama queen

God, what a dusty old chatterbox Schiller is. Like Bernard Shaw, he can’t put a character on stage without churning out endless screeds of cerebral rhetoric. But unlike Shaw, he has no sense of humour, nor any instinct for the quirks and grace notes that create a personality. Mary Stuart is a psychological drama with a single issue. How soon, and with what political consequences, can Elizabeth execute her treacherous cousin Mary? Schiller’s characters sound and feel identical: super-brainy, highly confident know-alls who treat each problem like a gang of Chancery briefs discussing a particularly knotty insolvency case.

Director Robert Icke’s regimented production imposes high-street fashions on England in the 1560s. The courtiers wear sharky two-piece suits like Apprentice candidates. Elizabeth sports a black velvet jacket, as if she were Melvyn Bragg taking a stroll on Hampstead Heath. Mary favours trousers too, naturally enough, and a secretarial blouse with pointy collars.