The Winter’s Tale

1. The Winter’s Tale A performance history

2. ‘An ill-made play…’? • NevillCoghill began an article on The Winter’s Tale in 1958 with the observation that ‘It is a critical commonplace that The Winter's Tale is an ill-made play’ (1958: 31). • Coghill, however, defends the play, describing its stagecraft as ‘subtle and revolutionary’ (1958: 31). • He identifies the ‘six main charges of creaking dramaturgy’ which have been made against it: • The supposed suddenness of the jealousy of Leontes • Exit pursued by a bear • Time • The crude shifts to clear stage in the Florizel-Perdita-Camillo-Autolycus sequence • The messenger-speeches in 5.2 • The statue scene

3. Tragicomedy • ‘…all their plays be neither right tragedies, nor right comedies, mingling kings and clowns, not because the matter so carrieth it, but thrust in clowns by head and shoulders, to play a part in majestical matters, with neither decency nor discretion, so as neither the admiration and commiseration, nor the right sportfulness, is by their mongrel tragi-comedy obtained.’ (Sir Philip Sidney, c. 1579, pub. 1595, Apology for Poetry)

4. Tragicomedy • Now, lest such frightful shows of Fortune’s fall,And bloody tyrant’s rage, should chance appallThe dead-struck audience, midst the silent rout,Comes leaping in a self-misformed lout,And laughs, and grins, and frames his mimic face,And justles straight into the prince’s place;Then doth the theatre echo all aloud,With gladsome noise of that applauding crowd.A goodly hotch-potch! when vile russetingsAre match’d with monarchs, and with mighty kings. (Dr Joseph Hall, ‘Virgidemiarum’, 1597)

5. Simon Forman’s account • On 15 May 1611, the Elizabethan doctor Simon Forman went to a performance of The Winter’s Tale at the Globe theatre: • ‘Observe there how Leontes, the King of Sicilia, was overcome with jealousy of his wife with the King of Bohemia his friend, that came to see him; and how he contrived his death and would have had his cupbearer to have poisoned, who gave the King of Bohemia warning thereof and fled with him to Bohemia. […] Remember also the Rogue that came in all tattered like coll pixie, and how he feigned him sick and to have been robbed of all that he had, and how he cozened the poor man of all his money, and after came to the sheep-shear with a peddler's pack, and there cozened them again of all their money. And how he changed apparel with the King of Bohemia his son, and then how he turned courtier, etc. Beware of trusting feigned beggars or fawning fellows.’

6. David Garrick, Drury Lane, 1756: Neoclassical tidying-up • The neo-classical unities of time, place and action are especially unsuited to this play; it is also clearly lacking a unity of tone. • Perhaps for this reason, most stagingsof The Winter’s Tale during the 18th century were adaptations: • The Famous History of Dorastus and Fawnia(1703); • Dorastus and Fawnia, or the Royal Shepherdess (1729); • The Royal Shepherd and Shepherdess (1749); • Macnamara Morgan’s The Sheep-Shearing: or, Florizel and Perdita (Covent Garden, 1754), in which the Old Shepherd is revealed to be Antigonus in disguise; • David Garrick’s Florizel and Perdita, A Dramatic Pastoral (Drury Lane, 1756).

7. David Garrick, Drury Lane, 1756: Neoclassical tidying-up • Garrick’s prologue: The Five long Acts, from which our Three are taken, Stretch’dout to sixteen Years, lay by, forsaken. Lest then this precious Liquor run to waste, ’Tisnow confin’dand bottled for your Taste. ’Tismy chief Wish, my Joy, my only Plan, To lose no Drop of that immortal Man! • Garrick’s adaptation featured Leontes (played by Garrick) in disguise at the sheep-shearing festival. • It was revived frequently throughout the century.

8. Charles Kean, Princess’ Theatre, 1856: Pictorial realism • The 19th-century tendency towards pictorial realism was perhaps equally unsuited to the play, which rides roughshod over historical and geographical accuracy. • Nonetheless, Charles Kean took the opportunity to use the play as the basis for a spectacular production, based on thorough archaeological research. • The set featured a detailed recreation of The Temple of Minerva at Syracuse; the production staged a full-scale Greek banquet and classical dances. • The Times described the production’s bear as ‘a masterpiece of zoological art’, and its Time as ‘Chronos, father of Zeus’, in a visual display which apparently had ‘all the effect of an exquisite piece of sculpture’ (1 May 1856).

9. Charles Kean, Princess’ Theatre, 1856: Pictorial realism The Allegory of Time (4.1), designed for Kean’s 1856 production by Thomas Grieve.

10. Charles Kean, Princess’ Theatre, 1856: Pictorial realism

11. Charles Kean, Princess’ Theatre, 1856: Pictorial realism

12. Charles Kean, Princess’ Theatre, 1856: Pictorial realism • ‘Mr Charles Kean’s principle of making the stage a vehicle for historical illustration was never carried out so far as in his revival of the Winter’s Tale. In the play itself, as every one knows, there is nothing to suggest excessive splendour of decoration. … Yet, as we have said, this anti-historical work has been used by Mr. Charles Kean as the theme for one of the grandest archaeological comments that ever took a pictorial form. … Leontes may not use a cup that is not of a proper pattern; his child, Mamillius, may not draw about a toy-cart that has not its terra-cotta prototype in the British Museum.’ (Times, 1 May 1856) • A write-up in Punch poked fun at this tendency: ‘Mr Punch has it upon authority to state that the Bear at present running in Oxford Street in the Winter’s Tale is an archaeological copy from the original bear of Noah's Ark. Anything more modern would have been at variance with the ancient traditions reproduced in the drama.’ (10 May 1856)

13. Harley Granville-Barker, Savoy Theatre, 1912: Rejecting illusionism • Thrust stage • Bold, non-illusionist design • Dennis Kennedy describes this as ‘one of the four or five most important Shakespeare productions’ of the 20th century (1985: 136). • Brian Pearce argues that this is somewhat overstated: ‘To show that Barker was in some ways “traditional” in his staging and interpretations is not to undermine his achievement but to provide a more comprehensive, less one-sided view of his work’ (1996: 397). • Barker’s Preface to The Winter’s Tale, 1912: ‘As to scenery, as scenery is mostly understood — canvas, realistically painted — I would have none of it. Decoration ? — Yes. The difference is better seen than talked of, so I leave Norman Wilkinson’s to be seen.’ (1993: 90)

14. Harley Granville-Barker, Savoy Theatre, 1912: Rejecting illusionism

15. Harley Granville-Barker, Savoy Theatre, 1912: Rejecting illusionism • Time (Herbert Hewetson) was presented as ‘a cruelly decadent Aubrey Beardsleyish figure, with twisted locks on end like golden snakes, a mask-like face, and hideously reddened lips and eyes’ (Globe, 21 September 1912).

16. Harley Granville-Barker, Savoy Theatre, 1912: Rejecting illusionism • ‘I was in direct, almost personal, contact with the players. Gone was the centuries-old, needless and silly illusion of a picture stage.’ (John Palmer, Saturday Review, 28 September 1912) LEONTES. There have been,Or I am much deceived, cuckolds ere now,And many a man there is, even at this present,Now, while I speak this, holds his wife by th’arm,That little thinks she has been sluiced in’s absence,And his pond fished by his next neighbour, bySir Smile, his neighbour. (1.2.191-7) • ‘Leontes moves from a character in the play, involved in the reality of his own situation, to a perspective like the audience’s, from which he surveys his role in the play, to a point beyond the audience, from which he can show them what they themselves are doing.’ (Hartwig 1970: 15)

17. Realism or artifice? • These historical productions sketch out some of the key choices facing modern directors and designers. • Stephen J. Miko describes The Winter’s Tale as ‘a play that plays with the art of simulation’ (1989: 268). • He argues that Shakespeare deliberately pushes dramatic conventions – comic and tragic – to breaking point: • ‘For example, how seriously can we take (and therefore treat) Leontes’ jealousy? Or, for that matter, the statue scene? Or, again, the notorious bear? Do the packages of ideas (and rules) that come with “tragicomedy,” “romance,” or “pastoral” really help us when we find the play incoherent, or embarrassing, or perhaps even incomprehensible? (1989: 259)

18. Ronald Eyre, RSC, 1981: Self-conscious theatricality • ‘The dominant visual motif of 1981, directed by Ronald Eyre, was that of the theatre, of performing a story. … Before [Camillo and Archidamus] finished their conversation, the tone shifted and the static stage picture gave way to one filled with action. Actors entered from the wings, chose props and costumes and assumed their places. Hermione picked up a sheaf of wheat; Leontes and Polixenes put on robes and crowns that had been displayed on the dummies. Voices off, a drum roll and a trumpet heralded a masque, directed by an energetic Leontes and performed on the central platform. Leontes darted anxiously about the stage, wearing a clown's red bulbous nose, blowing a toy trumpet and carrying a jester's bladder. Entering first, Autolycus, clad in black suit and top hat, led in an enormous black bear.’ (Tatspaugh 2002: 42-3)

19. Ronald Eyre, RSC, 1981: Self-conscious theatricality

20. Ronald Eyre, RSC, 1981: Self-conscious theatricality

21. Annabel Arden, Complicite, 1991: Playful storytelling • Physical theatre style • Cast of nine • The doubling, according to the production’s Associate Director Annie Castledine, ‘served a theatrical rather than thematic purpose’: the idea was that it should be impossible for the audience to sustain any one response to the play. • ‘Marcello Magni’sAutolycus, an Italian clown who elaborated his lines in Italian or English (the two indistinguishable in his accent), so that ‘three-pile’ (4.3.14) became “an Armani suit”. Picking lecherously on women in the audience, Magni tapped into a full tradition of commedia styles, playing out the timeless lazzi of trickery.’ (Holland 1997: 125)

22. Annabel Arden, Complicite, 1991: Playful storytelling

23. Annabel Arden, Complicite, 1991: Playful storytelling

24. Annabel Arden, Complicite, 1991: Playful storytelling • “McBurney’sLeontes was more neurotic and funnier than usual. … The jealousy was allowed a full quota of overtones of the comedy of cuckoldry. … The risk, treating Leontes as a trivially comic butt, was also offset by a violence predicated on his power as King. … Brilliant and unnerving, McBurney’s performance was impossible for the audience comfortably to pigeonhole.” (Holland 1997: 124-125)

25. Annabel Arden, Complicite, 1991: Playful storytelling • ‘In a haunting, slow-motion procession, with the nine-strong cast changing into costumes of mourning as they march, the production takes us back to Leontes’stragic court. There is a stillness in these final scenes which forms a fine contrast with the earlier manic activity, a real sense of wonder as the dead come to life and the divided family are miraculously reunited.’ (Charles Spencer, Daily Telegraph, 2 April 1992) • ‘Deconstructing Shakespeare is a scandal in the best sense of the word. Refusing to be servile to the text, Theatre de Complicité plants The Winter’s Tale (Lyric, Hammersmith) with abundant visual surprises. … Bawdy, exuberant, an updated commedia dell’arte, Complicité (directed by Annabel Arden) seems happier with comedy than tragedy, until the last scene brings a sudden bloom of pathos. Hermione’s slow, aged descent from the plinth is preceded by Paulina’s heart-rending summons, which emphasises the frailty of the body and the will to overcome it. Seeing her tears draws out your own.’ (AleksSierz, Tribune, 9 April 1992) • ‘…there are numerous signs of the play’s meaning being sacrificed to Complicite’s self-delighting cleverness. … I think they should remind themselves that the actors are the servants of the play and not the play the servant of the actors.’ (Michael Billington, Guardian, 4 April 1992)

26. Gregory Doran, RSC, 1999: Psychological realism • Antony Sher’s comments on playing Leontes: • My route is often through research, and so I went to talk to a whole range of experts in mental disorders… I spoke to psychiatrists, psychotherapists, all sorts of people – and eventually it was Maria Ron, from the famous Maudsley Hospital, who I talked to… She absolutely defined it as a medical condition called “morbid jealousy”, a condition that’s well known, that afflicts particularly men, particularly in their forties, in exactly, detail for detail, what Shakespeare’s written. (Lough 2005)

27. Edward Hall, Propeller, 2005: A sad tale’s best for winter • http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XmbZE_6_-EQ • Mamillius / Perdita / Time • Irresolution

28. Edward Hall, Propeller, 2005: A sad tale’s best for winter

29. Edward Hall, Propeller, 2005: A sad tale’s best for winter

30. Edward Hall, Propeller, 2005: A sad tale’s best for winter • Choric speaking (e.g. 1.1 and 5.2) • The penultimate scene of the play is self-conscious narration in Shakespeare’s text: FIRST GENTLEMAN.Here comes a gentleman that haply knows more. The news, Ruggiero! SECOND GENTLEMAN.Nothing but bonfires. The oracle is fulfilled. The King’s daughter is found. Such a deal of wonder is broken out within this hour, that ballad-makers cannot be able to express it. (5.2.20-5) SECOND GENTLEMAN.What, pray you, became of Antigonus, that carried hence the child? THIRD GENTLEMAN Like an old tale still, which will have matter to rehearse though credit be asleep and not an ear open. He was torn to pieces with a bear. (5.2.59-63)

31. Dominic Cooke, RSC, 2006: Communal experience • Promenade performance: • Spectators were cast as party guests at the opening New Year’s Eveparty, and invited to dance and to join in with Auld Lang Syne; • The audience were witnesses to Hermione’s trial; • They were cast as festival-goers at sheep-shearing (dancing once again); • They were required to ‘awake [their] faith’ in the final scene. • Dominic Cooke: ‘This idea came from noticing that the structure of the play is built around communal events: the trial scene, the sheep-shearing and the unveiling of the statue. These were events that the audience could be directly involved in. We also turned the opening scenes into another communal event, a New Year's Eve party. This again referred to the idea of time passing; the cyclicality of time, the idea that, like the country, the court has its seasonal rituals.’ (Bate & Wright 2009: 166)

32. Dominic Cooke, RSC, 2006: Communal experience

33. Dominic Cooke, RSC, 2006: Communal experience

34. Dominic Cooke, RSC, 2006: Communal experience

35. Sam Mendes, Bridge Project, 2009: A play of two halves

36. Sam Mendes, Bridge Project, 2009: A play of two halves

37. Sam Mendes, Bridge Project, 2009: A play of two halves • ‘The play’s second half is largely set 16 years later in Bohemia, which has been envisioned as a sunny frontier land, in the style of the movie musical Seven Brides for Seven Brothers. I assume that the contrast between these worlds is meant to make witty contrasting use of the Bridge Project’s bi-national cast of British and American performers. But the hee-haw hoedown sensibility registers as a knee-jerk artistic choice… It’s impossible to think of these knee-slapping Bohemians being integrated into Leontes’s court, not because they’re socially inferior but because they’re so silly and superficial.’ (Ben Brantley, New York Times, 23 February 2009)

38. Renegade Theatre, Globe to Globe, 2012: Mythology and fable • Restructured to make Leontes/Hermione plot a flashback • Nigerian mythology: Leontes became Shango, the thunder god, while Polixenes became Ogun, god of iron. • Parallel between Leontes and Polixenes • Audience participation • Alternative ending: Hermione/Oya becomes goddess of the wind

39. 2016 productions:The return of the fairy tale

40. Exit, pursued by a bear CLOWN. I’ll go see if the bear be gone from the gentleman, and how much he hath eaten. They are never curst but when they are hungry. If there be any of him left, I’ll bury it. (3.3.124-8) • Tragic scene interrupted by comedy? Comic and tragic at once? • ‘…the unexpectedness of an ungainly animal in pursuit of an old gentleman (especially one so tedious as Antigonus) can also seem wildly comic; the terrible and the grotesque come near to each other in a frisson of horror instantly succeeded by a shout of laughter.’ (Coghill 1958: 34-5) • ‘Through the eyes of the Clown we see Antigonus as a stranger, and the distance that the Clown’s impersonal perspective gains releases the audience from their sympathetic investment in Antigonus.’ (Hartwig 1970: 30-1)

41. Exit, pursued by a bear • Some bears: • Frequently naturalistic (e.g. Granville-Barker 1912, Cooke 2006, Mendes 2009) • Antigonus was chased off by a shaman in a bear-mask in John Barton’s 1976 production; this figure subsequently became Time. • The bear was cut entirely and replaced with a pirate in Renegade Theatre’s 2012 production. • It was an enormous billowing sheet in Doran 1999; a toy bear puppeteered by Mamillius in Propeller 2005; a gigantic puppet made of books in David Farr’s 2009 production.

42. Exit, pursued by a bear

43. References • Coghill, Nevill (1958) ‘Six Points of Stage-Craft in The Winter's Tale’, Shakespeare Survey 11, 31-41. • Granville-Barker, Harley (1993) Granville Barker’s Prefaces to Shakespeare: A Midsummer Night's Dream, The Winter’s Tale, Twelfth Night, London: Nick Hern Books. • Hartwig, Joan (1970) ‘The Tragicomic Perspective of The Winter’s Tale’, ELH, 37: 1, 12-36. • Holland, Peter (1997) English Shakespeares: Shakespeare on the English Stage on the 1990s, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. • Kennedy, Dennis (1985) Granville Barker and the Dream of the Theatre, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

44. References • Lough, Robin (2005) [dir.] ‘The Winter’s Tale: A Production Casebook’ on The Winter’s Tale: Complete Edition, DVD, London: Heritage Theatre, from the 1998 stage production by Gregory Doran. • Miko, Stephen J. (1989) ‘Winter’s Tale’, Studies in English Literature, 1500-1900, 29: 2, 259-275. • Pearce, Brian (1996) ‘Granville Barker’s Production of The Winters Tale(1912)’, Comparative Drama, 30: 3, 395-411. • Bate, Jonathan & Kevin Wright (2009) ‘The Director’s Cut’ in Jonathan Bate & Eric Rasmussen [eds] William Shakespeare: The Winter’s Tale, The RSC Shakespeare, Basingstoke: Macmillan, 162-80. • Tatspaugh, Patricia E. (2002) Shakespeare at Stratford: The Winter’s Tale, London: Arden Shakespeare.