How pertinent, poignant and perceptive of the Richmond Shakespeare Society to put on The Winter’s Tale on the very weekend the clocks go back as we enter the winter months. In Elizabethan England, a winter’s tale was a traditional pastime to entertain family and friends during the dark, long, cold nights of winter. Shakespeare’s The Winter’s Tale has been performing that very function since its first night in 1611 at the Blackfriars Theatre. The Blackfriars was a small indoor, cosy venue on the opposite side of the Thames to the open-air Globe. More suitable for winter evenings, the Blackfriars had a more aristocratic and educated audience who were entertained by candlelight. Although the small and cosy Mary Wallace Theatre doesn’t have candle lighting, it does offer intimate and highly professional productions from a totally dedicated company. Their current version of The Winter’s Tale is first-rate and can bear comparison with anything on offer in both the subsidised and West End Theatres. Last night was sold out, and I’m not surprised.
Shakespeare had done both comedies (As You Like It, Twelfth Night) and tragedies (Hamlet, King Lear) so towards the end of his career, he decided to have his cake and eat it, as it were, and write tragic-comedies. I believe that this new hybrid form may be Shakespeare’s most profound legacy. Why so? Well, life is a confusing mixture of comic and tragic experiences. We can’t say that our lives have been wholly tragic or wholly comic. In truth, for most people, life is a melange of both. By coining the tragic-comic genre, Shakespeare has provided us with an invaluable resource with which to understand and navigate our lives. He came to this realisation in 1608 and wrote four such tragicomedies before his death in 1616. They are Pericles (1608), Cymbeline (1610), The Winter’s Tale and The Tempest (both in 1611). They are his final artistic statements. They are, if you like, his last word on the human condition. And tellingly, his valediction is tragic-comic.
The Winter’s Tale has not been performed at the Mary Wallace in over thirty years, so I was thrilled to have the opportunity to see this production. The first thing to say is that this is a very watchable and believable production. Director Simon Bartlett has done wonders to put this on with limited resources. But what they lack in resources, they more than make up for in artistic intensity. The first half of the play is a rerun of Othello. Leontes, like Othello, becomes a jealous guy, to quote John Lennon. Unlike Othello, who has Iago to convince him of Desdemona’s adultery. Leontes self-radicalises. He alone is convinced that his Queen Hermione is adulterous. Luciano Dodero gives a chillingly convincing account of one man’s descent into paranoia, jealousy and megalomania. Contemporary audiences would’ve recognised this as behaviour reminiscent of Henry VIII, but for me it conjured up comparisons with Stalin or Mao. Louise Stenson portrays the wrongly accused Queen with dignity and integrity. She shows her vulnerability and resilience in the scene where Leontes pushes her to the ground. Although heavily pregnant, she maintains her composure. Imprisoned and then sentenced to death, Hermione looks set to be another Desdemona. But at this point, Shakespeare pivots and turns the play into a tragic-comedy. How he does this, you’ll need to see the play to find out.
The recognition, reconciliation and redemption finale is one of the most moving in all English literature. The myth of Pygmalion is invoked to transform life into death. The choreographer of this magical mystery tour is the King’s sister Paulina, superbly played by Caroline Tajasque. As master of ceremonies, she has the authority of Maggie Smith and the grace of Judy Dench. I can’t praise her higher than that. Sean Edwards and Will Hunter, as the pair of comic shepherds in the sheep shearing scene, are laugh-out-loud funny. The Jester Autoycus is realised with vivacity, vim, and vigour by the hugely impressive Charlotte Horobin. The future of the Richmond Shakespeare Society is assured if the performance of Bertie Dodero as Mamillius is anything to go by.
Review by John O’Brien
In the austere “imperial” court of Sicily, Queen Hermione is accused of infidelity by her husband, Leontes. Seized by ungovernable jealousy his actions have catastrophic repercussions. A dramatic change of scene transports us across sixteen years and to the bucolic idyll of the Bohemian countryside of the 1920s with young lovers, homely shepherds, a singing trickster, and a bear. Ultimately Shakespeare’s magic weaves all these strands into a harmonious resolution and what was lost is found.
Written by William Shakespeare
Directed by Simon Bartlett
Richmond Shakespeare Society presents
THE WINTER’S TALE
The Mary Wallace Theatre, Twickenham
25 October to 1 November 2025
