Film review: Coriolanus (2011 - The Weinstein Co)

Our president, Frances Dharmalingam, recently saw this film, which stars Ralph Fiennes, Gerard Butler and Brian Cox. Fiennes was also the producer: the screenplay was adapted by John Logan.

This filmed verion of Coriolanus could be cited as a perfect refutation of frequently-expressed doubts about using Shakespearean language in a modern setting. Although the script had been rigorously cut, what dialogue remained was original text (as insisted upon by Ralph Fiennes) and it worked. The delivery was entirely 21st century in style, the speakers unfettered by any unnecessary reverence for iambic pentameter, and, despite the occasional archaism of vocabulary or usage, expressed timelessly the thoughts and feelings of characters who could have existed in ancient Rome, Elizabethan England, or present-day Belgrade.

It was one of the finest modernizations of a Shakespeare play I have seen, with clever use of technology to further the action – TV broadcasts and Skype in place of clunky “messengers” up-dating the news.

The leading roles were perfectly cast – Coriolanus frozen in his arrogance, Menenius the fatherly figure Coriolanus so obviously needed but didn’t recognise, the two duplicitous tribunes Sicinius and Brutus – and of course Volumnia. What an impressive portrayal! This mother had dominated and moulded her son, and lived out her own ambitions through him. The only major character about whom I had any reservations was Aufidius. His darker, less trustworthy qualities became apparent only at the very last moment.

The crowds were huge and the director achieved a nice balance between the formless, threatening mass of the people and the individual rabble rousers who led the fickle sway of opinion. The scenes of civil unrest and the war episodes displayed the advantage of film over theatre. Where the latter would have to rely on conventional symbols – a few banners, suggestions of crowd action with Noises Off – the film showed us from endlessly varied angles the absolute reality of riots and battles in the 21st century. Of course the weapons were horrifyingly efficient, but the violence of war was as it has always been since before the days of gunfire, while in the house-to-house Search and Destroy missions there were echoes of ageless hand-to-hand combat, and at one point in the early rioting the police moved against the crowd with shields interlocked, suggestive of the old Roman “tortoise” formation. So for me the uncompromisingly modern interpretation had layers of timelessness, just as the psychology of the characters would have been true in any century.

Although the play does not, in so many words, give details of Coriolanus’s upbringing, the film established the separation between his family and the common folk. Shots of dilapidated buildings, stagnant puddles, piles of refuse and graffiti in the city contrasted with the elegant luxury of his family home, set in a quiet shady garden. Volumnia with her daughter-in-law and grandson, and then with Coriolanus himself, showed her strongly ambitious dominance, and when he capitulated to her pleas to spare Rome one could feel the unbearable tension and the final collapse, when Coriolanus knew that this could lead only to disaster. 'Oh mother, mother, What have you done?' summarised his apprehension of doom. Through the whole film, his facial expressions were extraordinarily limited, and yet he conveyed fierce intensity of feeling. Although never in any way a likeable character, he evoked (from me, anyway) sympathy as he moved inevitably to his fate, unable to change. A particularly memorable moment also was Coriolanus’s response to his sentence of exile. 'There is a world elsewhere' was spoken with all the contempt he had expressed to the citizens and yet it was coloured by a wrenching sense of loss, which made all the more believable his decision eventually to join Rome’s enemies.

This was a superb film in which the direction and the acting combined to bring to vivid life a fascinating play.

Frances Dharmalingam reviews Propellor's 'The Winters Tale'

A few weeks ago, Satima kindly invited me to accompany her to a performance of The Winter’s Tale, given by the English all-male group Propellor as part of the Festival of Perth. Their version was a fine example of effective story-telling. The narrative was plain throughout and could have been readily followed without much prior knowledge of the plot, thanks to clever staging and some fine acting.

The extreme contrast between the play’s two halves was strongly exploited. The court of Sicilia was claustrophobic, a setting closed in by dark metallic walls which reflected the action back upon itself. Colours were dull, lighting hard, the actors moving formally and with control. It was easy to believe that Leontes’s mad obsessive jealousy and rage could flourish in this ambience. All was presided over by a huge, changing, malevolent moon, reminding one of its associations with lunacy. The atmosphere thus engendered added to the horror of Leontes’ s cruelty, chillingly emphasised by Hermione’s bloodied skirt after childbirth in prison. The king’s emotional and physical decline and his repentant grief after the death of his son and (as he thinks) his wife followed convincingly, along with Paulina’s unrelenting determination that he continue indefinitely to pay for his sins.

The terrifyingly loud and vivid storm on the shores of Bohemia brought us to the turning point of the play. Here in the ensuing calm, all was golden sunlight and good humour, with no enclosing walls. The celebrations at the end of shearing in a rural community were always accompanied by feasting, dancing, singing, music and much youthful flirtation and merry-making. The age-old customs are all in the text; but this production was set some time in the later 20th century. The musical instruments, the dancing, choice of songs and particularly the noise level in performance, were more raucous Big Day Out than earthy Harvest Home, and the 17th century literary conventions of the pastoral idyll were dispensed with. There were some lovely moments of hilarity, particularly in connection with the flock of 'sheep' (in Arran jumpers) and the gulling of the Clown by Autolycus, when his money and even the gormless lad’s clothes were dextrously appropriated by the beguilingly glib rogue, but the more romantic and poetic qualities of the scene were sacrificed. Perdita delivered her lines and presented her flowers almost perfunctorily, and Florizel’s passionate declarations were muted, as if they were judged not to chime with the tone of the scene as a whole.

The return to Sicilia was neatly accomplished and the finale contained all the necessary tension to hold the audience right till the final resolution.

We were made conscious of Time (as a major theme of the play) in a number of ways. At the start of each half there was the loud ticking of a clock; the moon’s passage from full to half to dark; the changing seasons – all subtle but tangible reminders – and the lovely starry sky for the final scene, without the menacing moon.

I thought it a clever decision to have the same actor play both Mamillius and Perdita. With no change other than (obviously) the costume, the two characters’ 'family likeness' was a gentle addition to the concept of the reunion. Mamillius as a character is easily overlooked, since he appears only early in the play, but this echo, through Perdita, kept him in our minds, along with the surprise ending: when all but Leontes had left the stage, the king had a sudden brief glimpse of him, the dead son who surely would not have been forgotten. The director also gave Mamillius the speech normally delivered by Time (as a character), so he linked the two parts of the play as he described the passing of sixteen years with the help of toy models.

When I saw this company’s performances of The Taming of the Shrew and Twelfth Night some years ago, I was struck by the skill with which male actors could create absolutely convincing female characters with only their dramatic abilities; there was no compromise at all with wigs, padding or make-up to help. In this play again there were no wigs for the leading roles, but the women of the court wore head-scarves and were given long dresses, which did not really add anything. Overall I felt that the female characters were less successfully realised than the main male characters. Hermione certainly spoke with vigour and firmness in her own defence at trial, but lacked the warmth and charm one might have expected in the early and final scenes. Paulina was almost martial in her bearing – suitably unbending in punishing Leontes – but again, failed to elicit from me the sympathy I would have expected to feel for her as one deprived of her husband and forced to hide her affections for the mistress to whom she was devoted. These are minor quibbles, though. I was left, after the show, with much to admire and even more to ponder over, in terms of the company’s interpretation and presentation. It was a memorable evening, and the strength of this production, for me, lay not only in the actual performance, but also in its leading me back to the text and a re-consideration of how I think about it.

Katherine, Queen of England, come into the court!

During our recent reading of King Henry VIII, our president, Frances Dharmalingham, read the part of Queen Katherine with great sensitivity. She reports here on her experience and her "take" on the character of Katherine.

Knowing that it is a sought-after role, I was glad to be asked to take the part of Queen Katherine in the club's recent reading of King Henry VIII. Katherine appears in only four scenes of a long and complicated play, but still emerges as a fully rounded character, with strengths and frailties, and convincing indications of her background. Mulling over these qualities, I wondered how far they chimed with the historical person, so I referred to Antonia Fraser's thoroughly researched biography in her book, The Six Wives of Henry VIII. From this it was clear that the dramatic portrayal is remarkably faithful to the original.

Katherine of Aragon was the daughter of two royal personages, each a ruler in his or her own right. Ferdinand of Aragon had married Isabella, queen of Castile, and they reigned jointly, so inevitably Katherine from her earliest years was conscious of her heritage as a princess of a noble family. In the play there are frequent indications of this sense of the dignity of her position. Her upbringing was carefully supervised by her mother, who insisted on a broad education for all her children — academic, religious and (for the girls) domestic. Hence, Katherine was a competent linguist, who spoke Latin and French fluently, and after her marriage she learnt very good English. She could debate rationally with interlocutors of any standing, unintimidated by the trappings of power (as in her discussions with the great cardinals of the church). Although she was a devout Christian, she did not confuse religious dogma with the men who represented it; as she says in the play: ‘All hoods make not monks.’

Her beliefs required acts of charity for which she was much loved by the common people, who remembered particularly her donations on Maundy Thursday each year. We see in the play her concern also for her own attendants, when, for the second time in her life, she found herself husband-less and therefore poverty-stricken, unable to provide for her faithful women and servants. (The first such experience occurred in the seven years between the death of Prince Arthur and her eventual marriage to Henry.) Katherine was a skilled needlewoman and throughout her marriage sewed and embroidered Henry's fine linen shirts. Act III opens with a glimpse of Katherine and her women ‘at work’ sewing.

Her first appearance in the play reveals her strength, independence and awareness of the responsibilities of government. She is confident in her position as a loved wife and respected consort, daring to interrupt proceedings in the king's council chamber, to warn her husband of the common people's growing disaffection, thanks to the oppressive tax imposed by Wolsey. She is not afraid to imply some sympathy with Buckingham, despite the king's displeasure, and examines claims clear-eyed, without taking them on trust, as when she points out that Buckingham's surveyor had been dismissed from his post and therefore likely bore Buckingham a grudge.

In Act II, at her second appearance, Katherine's situation has changed and she is obliged to undergo the indignity of a trial, to determine grounds for a divorce. Given her upbringing, it is easy to believe that the idea of divorce is inconceivable to her, and she cannot agree to it, short of a direct order from the Pope. As well, she would no longer be queen if no longer married to Henry, but how can one who has been anointed in the eyes of God be ‘unqueened’, to use her own word? This scene contains the well-known appeal in which Katherine, dignified and articulate, puts her case before the king. It is an orderly and rational argument, presented without self-pity. Relevant points include the length of their marriage and her fidelity and loving devotion, and the fact that as a foreigner she is unlikely to find unprejudiced counsel. She refers also to their many children (although, sadly, only their daughter Mary had survived.) Her final point is a reminder that all due care had been taken prior to their wedding to ensure that it was legal.

As the scene continues, we have glimpses of anger, and she controls her temper with some difficulty as she makes perfectly clear her mistrust of Wolsey, the great prince of the church. ‘You are mine enemy, and (I) make my challenge / You shall not be my judge.’ This follows from ‘I am about to weep, but thinking that / We are a queen / (or long have dream'd so) certain / The daughter of a king, my drops of tears / I'll turn to sparks of fire.’

Several other short outbursts of temper, in all but the last scene, indicate Katherine's mettle, and prevent her from seeming implausibly good. She is basically so honest that she cannot lie, or sugar-coat her opinions, even when speaking of the dead. Her summary of Wolsey's character, on hearing of his death, is coolly exact and thoroughly unflattering, but immediately afterwards she is ready to allow Griffith to enumerate Wolsey's virtues.

Despite her reversals of fortune, she keeps up her courage to the end. She addresses one last letter to the king, seeking appropriate care for their daughter Mary, and for her attendants. The wording of this speech very closely echoes her actual last appeal to her ex-husband. Aware of her own impending death, she wishes to be buried ‘although unqueen'd, yet like a queen, and daughter of a king.’

I hope this is enough to indicate the rich depth of Katherine's character. For me, she emerges from the play convincing and thoroughly human, and someone with whom I can sympathise for her defenceless plight, while admiring her undaunted spirit.

The portrait of the young Katherine of Aragon, by Michel Sittow, is by courtesy of Wikimedia. This is a contemporary painting of the princess, created about the time she arrived in England. It can be found in the Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna.

Our very first post - from our president, Frances Dharmalingam

Welcome to our blog! Frances Dharmalingam, president of the Perth Shakespeare Club, has set the ball rolling with a post about our club's history and her own experiences of membership.  If you live in Perth and love Shakespeare, why not come along and join us?

Over to Frances now!

The Shakespeare Club of Western Australia was founded in 1930, which makes it probably one of the oldest cultural institutions still extant in Perth. In fact, we celebrated the Club's eightieth birthday last year. The founders intended to promote the reading, appreciation and performance of fine literature.

The membership in the early decades was large enough to justify fortnightly meetings, and doubtless more during rehearsal periods leading to the presentation of full theatrical productions of Shakespeare and other plays. These activities were led by such enthusiasts as Mrs. Anita LeTessier (nee Fitzgerald), a well-known exponent of elocution. Members were encouraged also to give recitals of poetry and to present papers on literary topics.

In its heyday the Club hosted many quite glittering social functions, including a soiree to welcome the then Poet Laureate, John Masefield, during his visit to Perth. By the 1960s, however, society was changing and there was a decline in numbers owing to competing interests and needs.

As the Club shrank, members' attention became more narrowly focussed. Meetings are now held monthly, and our studies are directed almost entirely to the works of Shakespeare. It is no longer possible to consider mounting public performances, but all members enjoy and give of their best in reading aloud the texts currently being looked at. We no longer hold lavish receptions, but take great pleasure in the social interaction with our fellow enthusiasts.

When I joined the Shakespeare Club it was with the idea that, at the very least, I would probably read three plays per year (rather than none most years!) and both revise and extend my acquaintance with Shakespeare. From that limited ambition I have gained so much more. Meaning is not only in the printed word, but also depends on and is enhanced by the speaking aloud. To examine a play in the company of friends with shared interests but varying backgrounds provides so many unexpected and valuable insights. The wider exploration of themes and ideas arising from the texts can expand our mental horizons indefinitely. These are just some of the reasons why I have continued to attend the meetings, and find so much pleasure in them.