GREGORY DORAN ANNOUNCES 2013 WINTER PRODUCTIONS AT THE ROYAL SHAKESPEARE COMPANY

I've been trying to follow a policy of putting out whatever press releases turn up in my email, only to realise that too many of them are stealth marketing or long, rambling monologues that try to cram an entire seasons' worth of information into a single message. So most of them end up in the drafts' folder, awaiting the day that I have time to pay enough attention to their important message.

Case in point: the RSC Winter Season. This release was the first announcement by RSC Artistic Director, Gregory Doran, and Executive Director, Catherine Mallyon, as leaders of the RSC. There's plenty of interesting details - David Tennant (now on the RSC board) returns to the RSC in the title role of Gregory Doran’s production of Richard II, Ella Hickson has written a new Peter Pan and
Erica Whyman outlines a new vision of radical mischief and new work ambitions for the RSC’s studio space, The Other Place.

Luckily, the release deals with events almost a year in advance. I thought I'd missed all of these, but I have got ten months to arrange a trip down to London for the first nights.

David Tennant will play the title role in Shakespeare’s Richard II. The first production in a new cycle of Shakespeare History plays that Doran will direct over the coming seasons, the collaboration between Doran and Tennant follows on from the hugely successful production of Hamlet in 2008. Richard II will transfer to the Barbican Theatre in December after its run in Stratford. 

In 2008, Tennant was Dr Who, and his lively reading of the Dane was as much about his TV character's personality as the magic of Shakespeare's script. Whether Tennant's Richard will imitate the tone of Tennant's adverts for Sky remains to be seen, but the youthful vigour of Hamlet is not reflected in the childish inexperience of the English monarch (his bad government caused the War of the Roses, by precipitating the instability of the monarchy to allow competing dynasties to stake a claim).


Ella Hickson gives a fresh new perspective on a much loved JM Barrie children’s classic with her new adaptation of Wendy & Peter Pan. This production continues the RSC’s tradition of family shows after last winter’s The Mouse and his Child, 2011’s The Heart of Robin Hood by David Farr and 2010’s Matilda The Musical, all of which played to great audience response and critical acclaim in the RST and the Courtyard Theatre.

Children's theatre is not as trivial as it might seem: much of the radical experimentation of contemporary performance is filtered into work for young people, since it can be used to lend an immediacy to drama. Ella Hickson is undoubtedly a rising playwright, but plenty of versions of Peter Pan exist, and its theme of missing children has a sinister air in the twenty-first century.

Hickson's reputation comes from her time as an Emerging Playwright on Attachment at the Traverse: indeed, the Edinburgh Fringe has already become a natural home for her work, which mixes a sparse, unsentimental vision of life and an almost magic-realist flair for theatrical spectacle. Part of the Old Vic New Voices, which feel like a gang of tough young authors, ready to fight both conventional and serious issues, she is an odd fit for a children's story that can veer towards the sentimental. Hopefully, her cunning use of multiple points of view, and talent for convincing psychology, will rescue this Victorian classic from Disney.

From spring 2013 through to spring 2014, the RSC celebrates its costume collection with In Stitches - an exhibition displayed throughout its Stratford theatres. The free exhibition will reveal highlights from the Company’s extensive collection along with new artistic responses, interactive displays and opportunities for visitors to try on RSC theatre costumes with a special dressing up box. 

As well as installations, displays and events throughout the building during the year, the PACCAR Room will feature Into the Wild, an RSC Costume Collection exhibition which explores how costume designers and makers have responded to themes of nature in Shakespeare’s work, interpreting them in diverse and imaginative ways. It will be an exclusive chance to see rarely displayed costumes, including many worn by some of the RSC’s best known actors including Dame Peggy Ashcroft, Sir Ian McKellen, Juliet Stevenson, Dame Judi Dench and David Tennant.

Scenography - that is, the bits of theatre that aren't the actor, the director, the script or the audience - is getting some long overdue attention. The strength of this exhibition is the opportunity to see some classic costumes and to recognise that here is an art form that is crucial to the success of a play - and has an aesthetic value in its own right. 

Richard II plays from 10 Oct – 16 Nov 2013 and Wendy & Peter Pan plays from 10 Dec 2013 – 2 Mar 2014 in the Royal Shakespeare Theatre. Richard II transfers to the Barbican Theatre to play from 9 Dec 2013 – 25 Jan 2014.