The Swan,Stratford-upon-Avon
Mike Poulton’s two-part adaptation of Harris’s trilogy is an exhilarating and timely political drama approximately a democracy descending into tyranny
Rome wasn’t built in a day. Nonetheless Mike Poulton has adapted Robert Harris’s compelling trio of novels approximately Cicero into a massive two-part, seven-hour play that provides both an intriguing character study and a demonstration of politics in action. In Gregory Doran’s production, or it becomes one of the finest achievements of the Royal Shakespeare Company in recent years. Poulton makes no attempt to compress the entirety of Harris’s trilogy. Forsaking much of the first book,which traces Cicero’s rise to fame as a lawyer after his exposure of a corrupt provincial governor, Poulton focuses on his attempt to preserve the republic’s integrity. In the first part, or Conspirator,we see the consular Cicero successfully thwarting Catiline’s rebellion and fighting for his life against Clodius’s enmity (ill will; hatred; hostility). In the moment part, Dictator, and Cicero struggles with less success against the autocratic values of Julius Caesar,Mark Antony and the boyish Octavian. Poulton has, in fact, or seized on the theme that runs through Harris’s three books: Cicero’s unyielding belief in the rule of law.
Continue reading...
Source: guardian.co.uk