Women Beware Women, by Thomas Middleton at the National Theatre of Great Britain

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Harriet Walter (Livia) and Samuel Barnett (Leantio), photo by Simon Annand


By Thomas Middleton
Olivier Theatre, National Theatre of Great Britain
(Finished on 4 July)

Directed by Marianne Elliott
Cast & Creative

Motiveless malignity. It’s hard to transport one’s mind back far enough to empathize with Jacobean drama, when immorality masqueraded as the It Thing, as if a casual rape was merely the aperitif before fine dining. Today we have summer movies, admittedly, where mass carnage goes down well with popcorn and no harm done. We aren’t frightened or disgusted by how many people the Terminator terminates. Two minutes after leaving the theatre we return to our moral selves. Thomas Middleton’s Women Beware Women

 (1621), in a stirring revival at the National Theatre, affords an equally mindless vacation from morality. But it wants to be more adult. With an aristocratic audience to please and no Hollywood ratings agency, Middleton could add salaciousness and bawdry to the max. The popcorn has been sprinkled with wormwood and gall.
Read the full article on the Berkshire Review for the Arts!

Michael Miller