Shakespeare Magazine 11
The shiny new-look Shakespeare Magazine 11 is adorned with a stunning cover image of Lily James and Richard Madden in Kenneth Branagh’s Romeo and Juliet. Also in Issue 11, SK Moore tells us about his compelling new graphic novel of Shakespeare’s Macbeth, while broadcaster Samira Ahmed turns her magnificently mercurial mind to the subject of Shakespeare. We have words with Pub Landlord comedian Al Murray about his recent brush with the Bard (and Judi Dench) at RSC Shakespeare Live. And our Editor raves about a 3-DVD box set of 1960s TV Shakespeare classic The Wars of the Roses. We chat with the great Don Warrington, star of Talawa Theatre’s earth-shaking King Lear at Manchester’s Royal Exchange – youthful co-star Alfred Enoch joins in too. Also this issue: we imagine what Tom Hiddleston’s Hamlet would look like, we explore the life of Elizabeth Siddal, Victorian Ophelia, and Bristol’s Insane Root scare the living daylights out of us with their Macbeth!
The shiny new-look Shakespeare Magazine 11 is adorned with a stunning cover image of Lily James and Richard Madden in Kenneth Branagh’s Romeo and Juliet. Also in Issue 11, SK Moore tells us about his compelling new graphic novel of Shakespeare’s Macbeth, while broadcaster Samira Ahmed turns her magnificently mercurial mind to the subject of Shakespeare. We have words with Pub Landlord comedian Al Murray about his recent brush with the Bard (and Judi Dench) at RSC Shakespeare Live. And our Editor raves about a 3-DVD box set of 1960s TV Shakespeare classic The Wars of the Roses. We chat with the great Don Warrington, star of Talawa Theatre’s earth-shaking King Lear at Manchester’s Royal Exchange – youthful co-star Alfred Enoch joins in too. Also this issue: we imagine what Tom Hiddleston’s Hamlet would look like, we explore the life of Elizabeth Siddal, Victorian Ophelia, and Bristol’s Insane Root scare the living daylights out of us with their Macbeth!
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Al Murray <br />
“Everyone was nervous. But a problem shared<br />
between a hundred people is a problem dissolved”<br />
production of Dream – I can still remember one<br />
speech from that – and then I played Antonio and<br />
Orsino in Twelfth Night. But comedy drags you<br />
away from thoughts of such legit endeavours.”<br />
<strong>Shakespeare</strong> Live certainly chucked you in at<br />
the deep end with one of <strong>Shakespeare</strong>’s alltime<br />
greatest comedy roles…<br />
“It was the most amazing experience. In February,<br />
I think, we had a call asking if I was interested.<br />
Was I interested! Greg Doran then called, and we<br />
had a short conversation, when perhaps you might<br />
expect a longer one. I just said ‘Yes, sure, of course,<br />
yes please, I’ve always wanted to play Bottom’. And<br />
we sort of left it there –‘We’ll send you the sides,<br />
put April 23rd in your diary’. As the RSC had<br />
been running A Midsummer Night’s Dream with<br />
the mechanicals played by local casts, dropping me<br />
in to play Bottom made lots of sense, but I’d have<br />
agreed to do it on ice, upside down, whatever.”<br />
Were you always aware that you would be<br />
doing a scene with Judi Dench? How did it<br />
feel when you were told?<br />
“Well, initially it wasn’t going to be Dame Judi.<br />
I forget who I’d agreed to be playing opposite. I’d<br />
been in Australia for the Melbourne International<br />
Comedy Festival, so when I got back there was a<br />
call about booking rehearsals into the diary, but<br />
this time ‘with Dame Judi Dench’. This was a<br />
shock, to put it mildly – and naturally my bragging<br />
rights soared in value!”<br />
As you can probably guess, <strong>Shakespeare</strong><br />
<strong>Magazine</strong>’s readers absolutely adore<br />
Judi Dench. She’s one of the greatest<br />
<strong>Shakespeare</strong>an actors, the finest speaker of<br />
<strong>Shakespeare</strong>an verse, she’s THE voice. Did<br />
you feel daunted?<br />
“Daunted, thrilled, determined not to make a<br />
mess of it! She was wonderful to work with, calm<br />
personified. And when she turns to you as Bottom<br />
and says ‘I do love thee’ – well, she means it.<br />
Top: Rufus Hound and Henry Goodman<br />
perform ‘Brush Up Your <strong>Shakespeare</strong>’.<br />
Above: Cleopatra (Harriet Walter) with<br />
Charmian (Amy Rockson, left) and Iras<br />
(Bathsheba Piepe, right).<br />
shakespeare magazine 31
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