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1992swan

'This production was remarkable for strong central performances and an irritating misuse of the Swan stage space.

Malcolm Storry's De Flores was formidable, and Cheryl Campbell's Beatrice-Joanna was plausible spoilt little rich girl, out of her depth in the murderous power games she initiated -- a state emphasised by the physical difference between the two performers -- Storry literally towered over Campbell.  

The building of a proscenium arch in this theatre in itself seems an ungrateful act, suggestive of nervousness of the open space of the thrust stage. However, one design feature which did make sense was the emphasis on religion, particularly in the opening -- the massed ranks of nuns present in the church where Beatrice-Joanna and Alsemero met and the huge cross hanging over the characters in this scene, dominating the space and stressing the unholiness of the action which was to follow. This Spain was very explicitly Catholic in its profession, if not its practise.

The sub-plot was made unusually clear with a strong Isabella (Emily Raymond), and the bablings of the inmates and changelings were clearly signalled as something for the audience not to worry about too much. A mimed fight between Antonio and Franciscus tidied up this plot.

By the end Campbell's Beatrice-Joanna was [...] a woman lost and confused and certainly not a woman falling in love with the man who had forced her to have sex with him. De Flores has also become very convincingly troubled about his crime, although the production made little sense of the attack on him by Tomazo.'

Elizabeth Schafer, RORD 33 (1994), 136-7