Tangled phonetics

Strange goings-on at the Globe. After a Tempest performed by Mark Rylance as a Reduced Shakespeare skit, we now have Pericles directed by Kathryn Hunter. This is a tricky, strange and fascinating dream-work. The text is so complex and elusive that the obvious approach is to play it straight and let the audience’s imagination fill in the gaps. Imagination. Audience. Not words many directors would welcome, since they imply a minimum of intervention. And here we have maximum intervention.

Kathryn Hunter has created a brash, stylish, modern-dress production which unfolds like a set of magazine photo-shoots. Everything is gorgeous, calculated, cocksure and superficial. On its own this would not be too bad but she has chosen two lead actors, Robert Lucksay and Marcello Magni, who were born not to play Shakespeare. One is Hungarian, the other Italian, and they perform the verse as if they’d learnt it on the way from Heathrow.