Review: TWELFTH NIGHT, Regents Park Open Air Theatre

Image Credit: Richard Lakos

Reopening what is perhaps London’s most beautiful outdoor venue, right in the heart of Regents Park comes Owen Horsley’s atmospheric vision for Shakespeare’s comedy Twelfth Night. Providing beautiful visuals and a delightful atmosphere, but leaves audiences, that are initially unfamiliar with the original play, wanting more in terms of the narrative through line…

With summer having seemingly arrived just on time to provide a beautiful accompaniment to Badia Bińkowska’s Mediterranean bistro setting, the stage is an absolute vision, as Regent’s Park often is. The simple layout of chairs and tables becomes a playground for the actors, adding a sense of freedom to their performances. And when the sun sets, literally we might add, Aideen Malone’s pastel lighting palette adds another dimension of beauty and atmosphere to the setting, deservingly assured in its athstetic. Bringing us full circle, Ryan Dawson Laight’s costumes bring to life the incredibly bold and varied characters of the tale. At once they distinctly define each performer and piece together in a cohesive vision that is a piece of art in its own right. All together, the design aspects of the show create the sense that one is peering into a piece of beautiful seaside art, utilised perfectly for this story.

And we must also say that each actor’s individual performances were a joy to observe, their comedic abilities, especially those of Matthew Spencer (Andrew) and Richard Cant (Malvolio) are phenomenal, eliciting laughs from the audience with just one look or a simple, but well timed twitch.

It’s unfortunate then, that when combined as one, each performance, excellent in its own right, struggled to compliment the others as well as it could under the production’s direction. The narrative, we found, was quite difficult to follow here, meaning that a deeper emotional connection to the characters was difficult to forge, and ultimately left us feeling a little disconnected to the details of the story. Whilst the show was still incredibly entertaining, thanks to the actors’ charisma and clear comedic ability, the fine details of the story became blurred, and we were left feeling that there could have been more done to connect the dots on behalf of the audience, and could have led to an even bigger pay off when all is revealed.

We would still recommend this production of Twelfth night! But perhaps with the added advice to check over the synopsis beforehand, as those with no prior knowledge of the story may find themselves a little at sea, but still very much entertained.