Much Ado About Nothing at the University

By FRANCES TILL

UNIVERSITY OF AUCKLAND CLOCK TOWER - Outdoor Shakespeare is usually done in audience-friendly ways that allow for fresh insights and convey a great sense of fun. This irreverently staged, well-executed presentation is in the centre of that approach and deserves a broad audience.

Much Ado has drifted on tides of audience sentiment away from the moorings of its central, intricate, clock-like structure into an exploration of the relationship between two charming secondary characters, Beatrice and Benedick. This production celebrates that trend.

Director Colin Mitchell pays a lot of homage to the Kenneth Branagh film of the play (although he claims otherwise), and it works well for him, especially since he has chosen to make Beatrice and Benedick the focus.

He's helped in that choice by wonderful performances from Andi Reveley as Beatrice, who is deeply and happily informed by Emma Thompson's portrayal of Beatrice in the film, and Richard Thompson as the effusive courtier/warrior Benedick.

Reveley, in particular, surrenders herself to the role, bringing a vitality and realism to even her difficult love scenes.

Also central to the success of this version is the villain of the piece, Don John, played brilliantly and with much camp cachet by Chanel Liquori as a murderous, emphatically female predator in the guise of a man.

Todd Webb provides high-quality low comic relief as Dogberry, the inadvertent hero in a role that the Branagh film may have settled for the next 20 years.

And the costume designer, Mary-Ellen Prendergast, deserves full credit for showing no restraint in the pursuit of style.

The cast is huge for a play of its type, but every character with important lines has a scene in which she or he can move to the front. The actors capitalise on each such opportunity, making the production a gem in both its bits and the whole.

Ultimately, the emphasis on Beatrice and Benedick that makes trivial so much of what should be essential action from other, ostensibly more important, characters, is perhaps only a minor flaw, essential to advancing this director's view.