Critical Essay | Critical Review by Kenneth Tucker

Critical Review by Kenneth Tucker

SOURCE: Tucker, Kenneth. “Cymbeline at the Globe.” Shakespeare Newsletter (spring-summer 2001): 37.

In the following review, Tucker praises Mike Alfreds's 2001 Globe Theatre production of Cymbeline as a “sprightly, well-paced production.”

Cymbeline offers an acting company a formidable challenge. Not only is its plot convoluted, but many playgoers find its apparent hero, Posthumus, reprehensible. In the throes of jealousy (created by the lies of the cynical Iachimo), Posthumus believes that his beloved Imogen is untrue and orders his servant to murder her. In fact some critics have judged their apparent inability to like Posthumus as the play's crippling fault. Despite these potential dramatic shoals, the Globe Theatre presented a sprightly, well-paced production that, on the afternoon I watched it, was surely an audience-pleaser.

Director Mike Alfreds departs from conventional stagecraft and sets out on what he terms “an adventure in story telling.” Instead of beholding a large cast in Elizabethan...
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