The Merchant of Venice by the RSC: A universe of divine discord

Introduction

Just to get it over and done with: NEVER UNTIL NOW have I seen such a bunch of incompetent actors assembled on one stage as in this production of “The Merchant of Venice”! I don’t think even in the “dark days”, when I was one of the two most faithful “followers” of my provincial theatre at Augsburg where I must have seen lots of bad productions. (As usual, I only remember the good ones.) But, most of the time, there was at least SOMEBODY who knew what they were doing … Well, there always is somebody who knows what they are doing, and maybe it’s best - and fastest! - to start with them and avoid mentioning the others. I already mentioned Brian Protheroe for reassuring “us” that we actually are in a Shakespeare play (- and maybe shouldn’t leave the theatre in the interval, which, actually, we SHOULDN’T have done …). But he played Aragon for what felt like about … three minutes. And there was Jacob Fortune-Lloyd who played the only INTERESTING Bassanio I have seen so far – after having played the only interesting Cassio I have seen so far, in the RSC’s production of “Othello” I liked so much. And Ken Nwosu was good as well. He played Gratiano and the Prince of Morocco “with the caskets”, and in that scene he went one step further and gave the most significant statement on this production, as far as the ACTING is concerned. He shrugged off the fancy jacket already on his way off the stage, as if to say: Done – THAT’S RIDICULOUS!

It might have been more of a personal statement, though: Now I have done my due and played the black guy again, but that’s it, let’s go and play SHAKESPEARE! (He has my blessing.) The important thing about this statement is that, apparently, more than usual, the actors were allowed, or encouraged, to make statements. The visible expression of this state of affairs was that most of the actors sat on benches ON THE STAGE during the performance, as if they were on the rehearsal stage, checking on what the other actors were doing. Of course there is a large range of possibilities as to what this might signify. For me, in this context, it became an expression of: We did this TOGETHER, and we decided – unanimously - that THIS IS CRAP! At least we won’t play it the way it is “always” played because we JUST CAN’T …

I am exaggerating, of course, but something like this became my general explanation for so much bad acting from people who should at least know what they are doing. As I wrote, playing Shakespeare is a universe of its own, and actors who are otherwise good may just be in the wrong place there. And there is probably no high-ranking Shakespeare production I have seen without at least one actor who fucked up, but I have never seen so many actors “systematically” fucking up one play. There were a few who were not in on it, see above, but they “kept quiet”, I suppose, and just did as they saw fit. And, in the end, it didn’t work anyway, I suppose to the gratification of the whole cast, but of that later …

As, miraculously, it didn’t work I could consider it as an interesting statement to concede that “Shakespeare” CAN be ridiculous – a lot of “Shakespeare” actually IS ridiculous, by the way, especially if we are looking at it out of context – or crap, or inacceptable. The more personal we take it, the more we dare to supply OUR OWN context, the more ridiculous or inacceptable it will probably become. Why should we always muster so much tolerance for what was written in “inhuman” times where dogs killing each other or burning heretics was considered entertainment??? … Well, having just read a lot of Philippa Gregory and being stuck in “Wolf Hall”, I could at least sympathize with this point of view. I suppose, though, that a “democratic” approach couldn’t be more than an experiment, and that, in the long run, ACTING will always be more important, but, if it was, it became an interesting experiment. The more so as, in the end, “Shakespeare” prevailed.

“Statements” and metaphors: There is nothing so difficult as justice …

I suppose that it couldn’t have been because of the acting that I came out “on the right side” of “Shakespeare” after having seen the RSC’s production, but it explained a lot about the play that I didn’t understand seeing the perfectly “smooth” production of the Globe BY METAPHORS displayed on the stage. It is not something I usually like very much, but sometimes I do, as I liked the discreet presence of skulls in the “woodwork” in “Richard III”. (Much better than the buckets of blood I would need for “Macbeth” …) The giant golden pendulum in the middle of the stage of the Swan Theatre was anything but discreet, but I somehow managed to ignore it until I had a theory about why it might be there …

Talking with my friend about the play alerted me to something important that I had forgotten during my long voyage “on” “The Merchant of Venice”. It was important because I had forgotten where I started, and with what baggage, but after we had talked about it I could assess much better HOW FAR I had come. As she is always much better at what is generally thought or known about a given Shakespeare play she mentioned the “two parts” of the play, and I knew what she meant without ever having read or heard it mentioned before. I have always “read” the play in two parts myself – one of which I kind of refused to read. And I have always been fascinated by the first part, about Shylock and Antonio and the bond, and bored, respectively repelled – as I remember now! – by the second part about Portia and the caskets. And I never questioned that there were in fact two parts, or stories, that were blended together in one play without really fitting, or really having anything to do with each other. And when we were talking about it I first realized that, with the help of the RSC, I overcame this concept and, I think, came to a deeper understanding of the play.

One thing that helped me on the way, and which, I think, came out of the RSC’s production, was the realization that the content of the play was contemporary at the time. There are very few plays, I think, in “Shakespeare” that were “modern” (in a 20^th century sense). Though, probably, that’s just my own perception because I could never keep track of the comedies. And, in my complete edition, “The Merchant of Venice” is listed with the comedies. Not without reason if we look at the “second part”: matters of love were considered “comedy stuff” at the time. Thinking about “The Shrew” (or, by the way, about what happens right now in my own family) I can say I REALLY DON’T understand why … And “The Merchant of Venice” offers a very deep – and kind of grim and sad – insight into what love can be like if we are looking at the relationship of Antonio and Bassanio. I think that this contemporaneity – about what people did with love relationships, or religious minorities and so on – is what lends this “sharpness” and depth of focus to the comedies that I don’t encounter in the tragedies, or ancient rape and splatter stuff like “Titus Andronicus”. I don’t know if this is cynical, but sometimes killing and dying seams less agony … (As I wrote, I gave credit to Jamie Ballard as Antonio for ONE thing: coming onto the stage IN TEARS for what he will never get, not even knowing it himself …)

What happens in the comedies is almost always less “literary” and more contemporary than what happens in the tragedies and histories, and as such I know that it will become interesting when I will have overcome the difficulties of figuring it out. For that, I knew, I had to get closer to the people I disliked, basically Antonio, Portia, and Bassanio, and was looking for “input” on that matter, with little success. Antonio is the most interesting, as the “interface” between the two parts of the play and in his own right. I’ll never know if I dislike Antonio because Jeremy Irons played him in the film (whom I stubbornly dislike as an actor, and in this case I stand to it because I ALWAYS see an actor when he is playing, besides the character he is playing.) It might have been the other way round, though, because I first became aware of him playing Antonio and might have begun to dislike him because of this. Anyway, no matter whom I will see playing Antonio and how they will play him, I will always dislike him because he uses his love - and money! - to “blackmail” the person he loves. Which doesn’t mean that he is not one of the most interesting (and “modern”!) characters Shakespeare has ever written. Doing justice to the fact that he – not Shylock! – is the title character of the play definitely became useful.

Thinking about the predicaments in which these characters stand – which I refused to take seriously before – certainly pointed me in the right direction, but I think I took repeated shortcuts, using the “metaphors” the RSC displayed in their production. I remember precisely the moment when I “became aware” of the pendulum, standing on the platform waiting for my train and thinking what I would do with “The Merchant of Venice”. And I became aware that I would want giant scales on the stage – to visualize the “equation”. This is not even something I like, though, and I thought it wouldn’t do anyway because it would be misunderstood, grossly pointing at Shylock’s pound of flesh. But there was this giant pendulum … Maybe THAT had something to do with it?

I think that was when I became fully aware of WHY I was doing equations. To keep track of the complex interpersonal situation, and how it evolves. And how all these relationships are coming into it, not just those that concern Shylock. I had already closed the rift between the two parts, including Portia and the caskets – and potentially every “ancillary” character or relationship, as, for example, the one between Jessica and Lorenzo, or Antonio and his other friends. Basically, WHY is he lonely, in the middle of so much company … ???

Music as metaphor: A universe of divine discord

Metaphors big time in exchange for the acting: that was the RSC’s “Merchant of Venice”. But I understand that it appeared more important to them to have a fresh perspective on the play. And one thing they did I really, really, REALLY loved, which was the MUSIC. I don’t remember, though, if I even noticed it before I had figured out why. They put a few singers on top of the big wall at the back of the stage who made really beautiful polyphonic music – which was contemporary but reminded me of early polyphonic music as, I take it, we would have heard in Shakespeare’s time. And I think this was ingenious because, when I noticed the metaphor, I became aware that they had understood the play the way I had come to understand it in the course of my “voyage”.

I looked it up, to be sure, but I was basically right about this. The 16^th century was the time when polyphonic music reached its (first) peak. So it was “state of the art” but still kind of “new”, and scandalous because the church still wanted to suppress it. They wanted the spoken word at the centre, and to be discernible, whereas polyphony gives precedence to the music, and the words come second. In the light of reading in “Wolf Hall” what had just happened in the church, in England and elsewhere, this became especially interesting. The efforts to suppress the MANY INDIVIDUAL VOICES that had just sprung up in so many places had led to serious political repercussions (basically: lots of burnings and beheadings, and worse …) which were still fresh in people’s memories.

I often have this feeling of contemporaneity when I am reading Shakespeare, and I am always trying to “find” it. That’s probably why I cherish the few episodes of “Shakespeare Retold” so much which the BBC regrettably doesn’t make anymore. Usually, I have it more about the comedies, but I have it as well constantly reading “Macbeth” (and am looking forward SO VERY MUCH to seeing the newest version of the RSC in June …) I think I am always trying to have it with “Shakespeare”, and I am sure many people do, in totally different places. My friend repeatedly said that she has it about “Titus Andronicus”. I understand what she means, but I am probably an incorrigible optimist and STILL don’t see our world QUITE like that. Though I never tire until I have “made up” the cruelest version of a comedy I can think of.  

In this case it was about something that was still rather new AT THE TIME: people making THEIR OWN lives and speaking with THEIR OWN voices, but we still “have” it and, quite often, it still leads to repercussions that are not entirely desirable. But we are used to it, I think, and even like it, like to watch it and find the polyphony of life beautiful, which explains a lot about “Shakespeare”, or “House of Cards” and the like … Sometimes it JUST HURTS. What I loved most in the entire production was when, at one point, the singers didn’t end their interlude in harmony but in a big, kind of DIVINE DISCORD – which sounded as if each voice closed on a different note. It was the biggest, most beautiful metaphor I can imagine for my ongoing experience that IT DIDN’T ADD UP. When there are so many people with so many different voices and so many different predicaments IT NEVER WILL.

Conclusion: Unlocked the casket!

So, it didn’t add up, in the end, but, in the case of the RSC, it came right. I don’t know anything about this, of course, but the production might have suffered from a lack of directing, at least in the first part. Actors who don’t know what to do won’t emerge as great actors, even if the potential is there. But the fact that they, maybe, had more of a DISCUSSION about the play instead of a proper rehearsal, might have turned out good in the end. That is, when things were running towards their climax in the big court scene where Shylock demands his bond and gets systematically dismantled. This scene is so scandalous in so many ways that, every time I see it, I can’t believe it. I CAN’T BELIEVE that anyone might have had the genius to write it … And when there is REAL discussion, real disbelief, and no ready acceptance, this scene turns out even more dynamic. I think that these dynamics, in writing, just developed from the story being set up as cleverly as it is, to create maximum effect. And if it is PLAYED like this as well it will infallibly make us feel bad and clueless – though, like in a real trial, we have the solace that justice was served and the villain got duly punished.

Well, this scene was still so much better – or worse! - than in any other production I have seen. There really WAS NO NEED, after that, to show Shylock being cruelly baptized, as the Globe did. (And it made me think about if my own vision how Shakespeare should be played isn’t right, after all … Well, it will never be proved, or disproved. And it would be rather a dangerous method …)

So, I must give great credit to this production, in the end, not least for taking risks. Metaphors, Music, dynamics, and the way they tried to make the discord bigger and point at the ambiguities - the things that don’t add up! - in people’s relationships, furthered my reading in the direction it was already going. For example, they showed the relationship between Jessica and Lorenzo as failing. I don’t know if I would go that far because it came out kind of gross, but it first made me aware of how much text Shakespeare has given to them that is quite ambiguous. It certainly could turn out either way …

And this was also, I think, why I took a closer look at the caskets. This part of the story had appeared stupid to me until the end, and I kind of ignored it, but after having “completed” my reading in the way I described I found an explanation even for them. The risk of FAILING is even bigger when we manage to take the relationship between Portia and Bassanio seriously. Not consider it as the kind of fairy-tale and comedy stuff it is to begin with. I think Shakespeare contrived to make it quite serious, as he usually does with “comedy stuff”, by showing their relationship to be endangered by Bassanio’s “unfaithfulness” – which is, in fact, faithfulness to Antonio! The heartbreak of having the world where he had this EXCLUSIVE relationship with Bassanio come to an end is Antonio’s tragedy – which, understandably, he UNCONSCIOUSLY tries to prevent by all means. But it is Bassanio’s and Portia’s relationship that is endangered by him “collecting his debt”.

In this case, “we” know that they will be alright – even though Antonio will still be “there”. (In EVERY production Antonio is left alone on the stage in the last scene. On second thought, I very much doubt that … But, from that day, he will only be a guest in Bassanio’s life.) And the reason that they will be alright is that they made the RIGHT choice. IT HAPPENS – though, I fear, not often. And I think that the point of the caskets is about how difficult, respectively IMPOSSIBLE, it is to make the right choice. I remember thinking that, even though they are ridiculed by the relieved girls, Morocco and Aragon are not actually STUPID. Their choice of caskets is not stupid but they chose rationally, according to WHO THEY ARE. They are not bad men or bad people, or insufficient, they are just who they are and, as such: NOT THE RIGHT PERSON. And because being set up for life often goes catastrophically wrong the choice of the right person is THE IMPOSSIBLE CHOICE. “We” choose, in the end, because love induces us to it. But what is love? Seriously, I think, only very few people ever come to know that. The closed casket is a great symbol for that choice. We choose without knowing WHAT we choose, and it will, IN ANY CASE, turn out different. Actually, Portia’s father was more clever, and “fatherly”, than she gives him credit for. He obviously knew what he was doing and set the whole thing up so as for her to be chosen FOR THE RIGHT REASON. There is no guarantee in that, by the way, but it might reduce the odds …

Right now, I appreciate “The Merchant of Venice” very much for providing me with such a complete experience of “Shakespeare”. As if there was no substantial part of the play left that is not covered by it. But, about this, I must certainly be wrong???