Upstart Crow review: Panto meets pentameters in funny but exhausting Shakespearean play

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Nick Curtis @nickcurtis18 February 2020

Fans of Ben Elton’s Shakespearean sitcom won’t be disappointed or wildly excited by this stage adaptation. It’s just as clever and coarse, irreverent and worshipful as the TV version. Panto with pentameters, only longer and in an actual theatre this time.

A troupe led by David Mitchell’s vain, perpetually exasperated bard hit us over the head with gag after gag, some deeply rooted in knowledge of his life and work, others mere gormless wordplay about “puffling pants”. Shakespearean England is again refracted through a modern lens so there’s material about public transport and gender fluidity. It’s funny but exhausting.

After the death of his son, Shakespeare gets over writer’s block by nicking ideas from other people. His landlady’s daughter, wannabe actress Kate (Gemma Whelan) gives him the plot of King Lear.

A pair of noble Egyptian twins recall Twelfth Night — as does the humiliation-by-codpiece of Mark Heap’s lovestruck puritan — and also spark the idea for Othello. You can spot the mile-off joke about The Winter’s Tale the moment the dancing bear appears.

It’s intricate but deliberately unsubtle. Indeed, the arch staginess of Sean Foley’s production is underscored by wobbling backdrops and tiny trees behind which characters hide. There’s affection behind the whole elaborate send-up but it’s all in service to a relentless stream of set-ups and punchlines. The script has also clearly been tailored to cover notable absences from the TV cast: no Liza Tarbuck.

Mitchell makes an assured West End debut though, as the Eeyore-ish Will. He has splendid timing, which is essential with this material. Whelan winningly reprises her role as feminist stooge while Steve Speirs really has to overact as Burbage to rise above the mugging of the rest of the cast.

It’s what we expect from Elton but at times I wished for some let-up in the relentless, snarky, sledgehammer wit. A pause, a pause: my kingdom for a pause.

Until April 25 (0844 482 5130, Upstartcrowthecomedy.com)

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