A Midsummer Night’s Rave – Shakespeare’s comedy gets a 1990s makeover
A Midsummer Night’s Rave – Shakespeare’s comedy gets a 1990s makeover
Fiona MountfordSat, September 26, 2026 at 12:20 PM UTC
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The enchanted forest becomes an all-night party on the South Downs - Manuel Harlan
Here’s an ingenious spin on A Midsummer Night’s Dream at Chichester Festival Theatre, combining integrity to the text with a wonderful sense of local identity. In this most over-performed of all Shakespeare’s plays, the frolics in the Athenian forest have morphed into an illegal 1994 rave on the South Downs, while John Major’s “back to basics” Conservative government struggles to reassert the supremacy of law and order.
Soon-to-be-wed city ruler Theseus is now “Theseus Howard, Member of Parliament for Chichester”. The beauty of director Justin Audibert’s vision is how easily Shakespeare’s ideas – the countryside representing a place of freedom and self-expression away from the constraints of city life – slip into this fresh setting. It’s a template that theatres all around the country would do well to consider.
Munya Chawawa brings swagger to Bottom, against a backdrop of neon-lit geometric panels - Manuel Harlan
The tangled quartet of young lovers has also been slightly. Well-brought-up private-school-type Hermia (Angela Sant’Albano) is in love with a gender-switched Lysanda (Ellie Larkin), while her police chief father wants her to wed Demetrius (Kieran Taylor-Ford). He in turn is the object of the unrequited affections of Hermia’s best friend, Helena (Freya Parks, who’s outstanding at lovelorn self-pity).
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Out of the city they gallop, where Oberon (David Sturzaker) and Titania (Eve Ponsonby, in a silver sparkly strapless leotard and extravagant tights) preside over an all-night rave, full of mind-altering substances. Large cut-out diamond shapes of canvas span the ceiling of the august Festival Theatre, over which changing patterns of neon light play in true rave fashion. What could be a more apt place for Shakespeare’s love-inducing magic potions made from mysterious herbs?
Freya Parks as the lovelorn Helena, caught up in the play’s tangled romantic pursuits - Manuel Harlan
There’s a slightly underused ensemble of eight ravers which needs expanding, perhaps by enthusiastic members of Chichester’s award-winning youth theatre. The fairy realm, too, is the least fully developed section characterisation-wise. It’s overshadowed by Conservative Club chairman Peter Quince (Giles Taylor) and his glorious ensemble of amateur players, who are headed by comedian Munya Chawawa as a grandstanding Bottom. When these try-hards come to perform their Pyramus and Thisbe playlet, they’re all decked out in mischievously over-exaggerated Conservative true blue and white (it was Major’s government, after all, that cracked down on Britain’s illegal rave scene).
Such fresh thinking as this deserves to be widely seen and admired. Chichester once again proclaims its place as the country’s outstanding regional theatre.
Chichester Festival Theatre, until Oct 17
Source: “AOL Entertainment”
