On November the 9^th, I went to see Bell Shakespeare’s performance of Taming of the Shrew by William Shakespeare at the Playhouse in Sydney Opera House.  Director Marion Potts wished to remove the meta-theatrical ideal of having men playing male characters on stage and have the audience overcome the obstacle of gender when engaging with such a chauvinistic play. To do this, she used an all-female cast. But her radical ideas didn’t stop there - mixing early-modern English language with a karaoke bar, gambling and disco balls. This aesthetic and the song choices confused the text alongside Kate (Lotte St Clair) and Bianca’s (Emily Rose Brennan) costumes – dressing gowns, UGG boots and slippers. It did not fulfil Potts’ original argument about overcoming the chauvinism in the text by providing a target for female ridicule in Bianca.  It looked a mish mash of themes, Bianca being particularly over childish and stroppy in her fluffy pink slippers and dressing gown singing flamboyantly down a microphone to 70’s, 80’s and 90’s songs, which became an embarrassment at times. 

Chief chauvinist Petruchio played by Jeanette Cronin was the production’s highlight, although there was rarely any indirect mocking of males, which would have challenged gender roles further.  The dramatic irony of Jeanette dressing as a haphazard drunk ‘bride’ for Kate and Petruchio’s wedding wasn’t lost however.

The show was too focused on challenging the status quo that it did not target the rudimentary points in the original text where this could really be done.  Performed well, it was let down by the confused aesthetic and lack of understanding of the original text.