Ah, this scept'red isle, this blessed plot, this bloody awful climate. Open-air Shakespeare is always a touch-and-go affair, and with thunder rolling over the Shropshire hills, it becomes apparent that Richard's battle with Bolingbroke is destined to take secondary importance to Richard's battle with the weather.
The 46th Ludlow festival has taken a radical turn in inviting Steven Berkoff to direct the showpiece event. In ebullient fashion, Berkoff delivers a highly choreographed, rather perversely conceptualised, approach - given a period castle to work with, he opts for a dandyish toppers-and-waistcoats look. Yet what emerges, given the vagaries of the climate, is an impressively sustained study in dramatic irony.
You only have to watch Richard II in a downpour to realise that the play is awash with meteorological metaphors. Scroop warns his king of "unseasonable stormy days", while John of Gaunt forecasts (wrongly, as it turns out) that "small showers last long, but sudden storms are short". And as the rebellious factions grow impatient, the Earl of Northumberland gives a literal ring to his declaration: "Lords, we hear this fearful tempest sing / Yet seek no shelter to avoid the storm." That line gets the heartiest cheer of the evening, along with the PA announcement that waterproof ponchos are on sale in the outer bailey.
Richard II is Shakespeare's most lyrical history play, alone among the canon for being written entirely in metre. Unfortunately, it is impossible to form an opinion on the quality of the verse speaking with the rain thrumming down so hard on one's umbrella. But, visually speaking, the production mines the familiar catalogue of Berkovian physical gesture: imaginary horses, imaginary embroidery, imaginary billiards etc.
All credit must be paid to the cast for gamely battling against the conditions; though when Timothy Walker's sopping Richard exhorts his cronies to "sit upon the ground and tell sad stories of the death of kings", the look on all the assembled faces suggests they'd rather not.
Nor can one overpraise the audience for sitting stoically until the middle of act three when the lighting rig is eventually declared a safety hazard and Richard forced to conclude with the poignant couplet "hence away / From Richard's night to Bolingbroke's fair day". As a summing up of what happens in the rest of the play, it's as good a place to take one's leave as any.
· Until July 9. Box office: 01584 872150.
