Elena Peneva

Twelfth Night
Live theatre excites and engages its audience in the 21st century as much as it did in its original
performance. Discuss the above statement in relation to the play you have seen, compared with
your knowledge of its original performance. [30 marks]

William Shakespeare’s plays can always be interpreted and remade via the exploration of different
concepts and techniques. Twelfth Night is one of his comedies that has been adapted and
performed many times.
Watching its most recent adaptation directed by Simon Godwin in the National Theatre I realised
how even old time classics can be remade in ways to provoke strong emotional response in the
audience and leave them with an unforgettable experience.
Twelfth Night was originally performed in the Middle Temple Hall in 1602. In the 17th century the
set design was minimalistic due to the lack of props, technology and funding. For this reason plays
did not have the chance of set change and it most likely remained the same throughout the entire
play. Actors often had to refer to time, place and weather in the dialogue so that the they could
clarify and convey the meaning of the play to the spectators. Contrastingly, Twelfth Night’s modern
version in the National Theatre involves a far more advanced set, thus attracting the audience and
creating and immersive experience for them. Considering we live in a society that gives us the
opportunity to create any sort of visual and sound effects in theatre we could confidently recognise
the exploitation of contemporary techniques that theatres nowadays use. For example, throughout
the play there was a live band playing on different instruments such as clarinet, piano, saxophone,
etc. They were placed on the galleries of the theatre or appearing on stage at some points during
the performance. In Shakespearean times there were some instruments such as the violin and
drums that could have been used in plays, however this interpretation of the play involved a variety
of instruments that could work on the play’s emotional catharses. Music was really important during
Elizabethan times and people’s worship towards it is represented in some of Shakespeare’s plays,
including Twelfth Night. This was particularly displayed by the actor playing the fool Feste in the
21st century adaptation of it . In Act II Scene II there is Feste who despite her wild and party loving
nature sings a beautiful song in a slow tempo which definitely created an emotional impact on the
audience.
Shakespeare wrote a few decades ago. If directors stuck with the original performance conditions
of Twelfth night, rather than experimenting and inventing new concepts his plays could be doomed.
Thus, the use of such modern and sophisticated set design in the adaptation by Simon Godwin
attracts audience in the 21st century, because it is relevant to us, we emphasise with issues that
characters speak about, we get interested into the concept of the play. Even though the entire
setting, costumes, music, props, etc. was renovated and the play itself was extremely entertaining,
the language used in the original performance conditions had not been changed. Except from
several pronouns such as referring to ‘she’ instead of ‘he’ when talking about Malvolia, the original
language in the play was preserved. Shakespeare wrote in prose and verse. The verse was used
by common characters such as Toby Belch and the servant Maria and their representation in the
play clearly emphasises this in scenes such as when Sir Toby Belch introduces Maria to Sir
Andrew. However, Shakespeare is more famous for his use of verse in characters who are
presented as ‘aristocrats’ such as Viola and Duke Orsino. Most importantly, Shakespeare’s writing
could be read through the recognition of iambic pentameter which is defined as a ten syllable line
with the accent on every other syllable. This division of style in Twelfth Night helps to further on
understand the characters and their roles in the social hierarchy.

The most innovative and controversial decision of the director was the gender swap. The character
of Malvolio, characterised as a puritan is now transformed into Malvolia. Not only this, also the
actor playing the fool Feste in the original performance is a woman, same for Olivia’s court that in
this adaptation consisted of females. In the 17th century a playing company known as the Lord
Chamberlain’s men performed in Shakespeare plays. They were all men as at that time women did
not have the right to act in the theatre. Contrastingly, this clever decision to play with the gender
 Elena Peneva

conventions gave Godwin the recognition of a director of his time who addresses political and other
contemporary issues in an artistic way.

The character of Malvilio(a) was played by Tamsin Greig who is known to be an English comedy
actress. Her interpretation of Malvolia was hyperbolic, playing with a variety of stereotypes. In my
head Malvolia resembled a strict primary school teacher. She uses a lot of hand gestures, her
voice is particular and the change of pitch all of a sudden in certain lines establishes the character,
meanwhile bringing about a comedic note. Firstly, looking on the surface the choice of having a
star to play the character of Malvolio hints at us that the director pays great importance to this
character in particular. The performance of Tamsin Greig was brilliant, she managed to convey
stereotypical traits of Shakespearean Malvolio, yet successfully renovated this character and gave
the audience a chance to look at him(her) from a different POV. Initially the character of Malvolio
was established as an obsessive and controlling person who wants to have control over the
household and secretly dreams about her master Olivia. The climax in the play, thus Malvolia’s
quest to breakdown began when she wrote the fake letter who she believed was from Olivia in Act
II Scene V. Malvolia practices tai-chi, it represents her personal space. Afterwards, the metaphor of
her drenching in the fountain refers to Malvolia’s ‘disclosure’ : the less clothing she wears the more
we understand about her. Water has a deep and crucial symbolism in this play. As for its cleansing
powers, the play opens with twins being separated during a storm which is represented through
rain and storm sound effects; similarly, the play finishes with Malvolia being exposed to the rain
with minimal clothing on her. I believe that this modern adaptation of Twelfth Night conveyed the
meanings and aims of the original play in a very sophisticated and metaphorically powerful way.
Simon Godwin took advantage of the resources our society is exposed to and created an
adaptation on a high level so that it could be an entertaining, educative and different experience for
an audience, rather than being old-fashioned and close-minded.
So far we have encountered Malvolia in situations where precisely pointed fingers, raised and
lowered her vocal tone and tried control over the household. However, the audience had realisation
that this point was crucial for the life of Malvolia, however the real shock occurred when Malvolia
revealed herself in yellow stockings whilst a spotlight was highlighting her physique and she stood
on top of the staircase of the revolving pyramid set. Here she appeared as following the ‘order’
from the letter - wearing her rigid smile.
Gender and its role in a society is a highly discussed topic in today’s society. We are all politically
aware of gay relationships and when this is portrayed in a piece of art, in this case theatre,
audience recognises the values and ideas that are conveyed. For example, in this play we had
black people as actors(Viola and Sebastian), gay/lesbian relationships (Antonio-Sebastian) and so
on. Moreover, the topic of feminism is widely spoken today. Olivia’s court involved only women ,
whereas in the original performance conditions this would not have been so. Malvolia’s bleached
hair could be argued as a sign for rebellion against stereotypical views of female beauty
or ,alternatively revelation of her true sexual identity. In Twelfth Night’s original performance it could
not have been possible because people at that time had totally different understandings of society.
Moreover, when there was a female character it was performed by a man, thus it looked hilarious
for the spectators. For example, Viola would have been played by a man who pretended to be a
woman but then when she transformed into Cesario the actor would be a man.
This adaptation was set in around 1930s where the Jazz culture in America arouse. This was
clearly emphasised by the use of set locations such as Olivia’s yard and the Elephant transvestite
cabaret bar. In the scene taking place at the cabaret bar Godwin decided to include the quotation
‘’to be or not to be’’ in a song which is originally from Hamlet. This scene was an extremely
beautiful ‘summary’ of the play itself and it displayed several of the above mentioned societal
debates at once.

Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night lacked fourth wall in its original performance, and so did in its most
recent production. In old times audience would be ‘’part’’ of the actors by interacting at them,
making jokes and talking directly to them whilst keeping close proximity with the actors. Godwin
decided to keep that sense of interaction by making his actors address the audience from time to
time. He did in a sensible way, often when a character speaks to the audience there is a spotlight
 Elena Peneva

on them and the rest of the ensemble remain in freeze frames at the background. Such scenes
include Viola’s realisation that her brother is alive when Antonio confused Cesario(Viola) with
Sebastian in Act III Scene IV.
Overall, Simon Godwin’s contemporary interpretation of Twelfth Night was a powerful message to
our society. It preserved Shakespeare’s initial themes and motifs, however it was mostly adapted
into a play that would be relevant to a 21st century audience. I believe this performance proved
that old time classics could be taken and transformed by taking advantage of the values our
society possesses today and the technological opportunities it offers. Nevertheless, this
interpretation went beyond my expectations and I was strongly impressed by watching it.

I have more to say, I will keep on developing my live evaluation notes.