Midland Players’ Much Ado About Nothing – 24 September 2025, University Drama Studio
Review by Paula Turner.
Shakespeare plays always start out with the difficulty of audiences’ prior expectations, from studying texts at school to seeing cinema versions. But Much Ado About Nothing’s will-they-won’t they frenemies to lovers can still hit a note with modern audiences, and this adaption by Heather Farr, who also directs, doesn’t disappoint.
In the Directors Notes, Farr comments that she wanted to offer ‘an adaptation that used the original language, but in a stripped back way…both accessible and enjoyable.’ She has certainly achieved that, getting rid of some lines that would seem unnecessary to a modern audience and cutting outdated references and jokes, to leave us with a text that feels both whole and natural.
As in the 2012 film version, the director has chosen a contemporary setting in modern dress which immediately draws its audience in. A simple set construction (designed by Farr and Phil George) provides a perfect backdrop to the whole of the action with minimal use of props, and the soundtrack of recognisable music and background chat (designed by Tony Kennick and delivered by Ruth Jepson) perfectly complements this.
The cast – many of whom are familiar faces from past productions – appeared confident and well-rehearsed in their roles even on the first night, right from the confident opening speech by Leonato (Rach Howard) to the final energetic ceilidh style dancing of the closing scene by the whole ensemble.
In the relationship between Benedick and Beatrice, here we have a Benedick (Steven Garner) who is entertainingly swaggering and self-centred and a Beatrice (Samantha J H Oldham) who is strong and relatable in her frustration at a male centric society. Her speech from the deckchair where she laments that she can’t kill Claudio herself is particularly strong. You feel the two may well be in love, but would it last?
The young lovers are satisfyingly naïve. With Kiera Rhodes’ Hero looking perplexed at the deception and Claudio (Hal Grayson) being both ardent and gullible, they can almost persuade us that there is a case for breaking off the wedding.
The members of the Watch are bumblingly funny layabouts led by a self confessed donkey. Andrew Graves’ Dogberry is dressed initially like Inspector Clouseau, then like a 1970s TV cop, and spews malapropisms while he toadies to the nobility, but it’s his officers who solve the case, shame the miscreants and save Hero and Claudio’s marriage.
There was a standout performance from Matt Voice as Borachio, playing one of the best stage drunks I’ve ever seen, and Daniel O’Key’s Don John is the perfect out and-out villain who smiles and lies pretty much for the fun of it. Flic Powell’s performance as Don Pedro was excellent, and one that I’ll particularly remember, with the proposal to Beatrice in particular being especially affecting as well as funny.
And there is a point that I should certainly have made before – the production is genuinely funny. The audience seemed reluctant to laugh at some of the subtle jokes initially, but this is in my experience a common reaction to Shakespeare comedies and most definitely not a reflection on the performers’ delivery.
The whole cast are alive when they are on stage – no wooden spear-carriers here! A particular joy was the way the maid Margaret (Ruthie Woodhouse) looks horrified and backs into the wings on learning she has been used to frame the scandal.
As we left the auditorium my partner said to me ‘Well, my review is that I definitely liked it’. I’d echo that. Midland Players’ productions are always reliably entertaining, whatever the genre. They have been going for over 45 years, and on the strength of this production I look forward to their next season.
