Director Ellen McDougall’s production of Shakespeare’s pastoral romance brings a much-needed infusion of warmth to this lacklustre summer. The play’s been given a light dusting of modernity, topped and tailed with speeches penned by trans artist Travis Alabanza, and with the cast singing songs by the likes of Troye Sivan and Tegan and Sarah (not well, but charmingly).
The Globe’s now-habitual gender-fluid approach to casting chimes perfectly with this story of disguise and confusion: we might be experiencing the same kind of mind-expanding uncertainty Shakespeare’s original audience felt. Above all, I believed in almost all of the relationships here, which is rare. Even the lesser characters are endowed with dignity, at no expense to their comic value.
