Seemingly set somewhere between heaven, Ibiza and a novelty Instagram backdrop, Jamie Lloyd’s remarkable production of Shakespeare’s Much Ado About Nothing eschews a conventional set in favour of a drift of candy-pink confetti that blankets the gargantuan Drury Lane stage. Designed by Soutra Gilmour, there is never not confetti falling, wafting through the air like man-made cherry blossom. At moments of high excitement (of which there are many) it erupts from the rafters. The first half ends with co-star Hayley Atwell’s lovestruck Beatrice squealing orgasmically - the full Donna Summer - with her back to us, caught up in a snowdrift of confetti, a gigantic pink heart hovering over her.
There are those who have become cynical about Lloyd ever since his career went into overdrive with his smash 2023 revival of Sunset Boulevard. And to be fair, those that moaned about the casting of Sigourney Weaver in The Tempest – which preceded Much Ado at Drury Lane, and shares much of the same cast – were basically right, though one celebrity miscasting hardly ruins a career. But accusations that he relies too much on live video (he’s used it in two shows), the same monochrome palette (okay, there has been a lot of black) and relentless tasteful moodiness are all but trolled by this none-more-pink symphony of a production, that totally abandons conventional cool in favour of Tom Hiddleston’s dad dancing.
This impressionistic Much Ado doesn’t take place in a specific space or time, but its vibe is that of an endless, hedonistic holiday, its wild romantic currents mirroring the internal melodrama of a week away with a group of friends.
Seasoned Shakespearean Hiddleston is clearly having the time of his life here as a man-child Benedick, who smarmily addresses the audience directly, often milking them frantically for applause. It’s a nod to Hiddleston’s own celebrity, but it's as if he'd ended up at an end-of-the-pier variety club rather than doing Marvel films.
Key to casting him and Atwell is that yes, they are very beautiful screen heartthrobs. But they’re also fortysomethings. Her bolshy, passionate Beatrice is too addicted to being the strident queen bee of her circle of friends to let anyone into her life; he’s the applause-hungry oddball. But they’re both eccentric figures - middle-aged singles who look terminally uncool next to Mara Huf’s fantastically full-on Hero and James Phoon’s giddy, silver-suited Claudio.
Things get goofy. At one point Hiddleston jumps through a trapdoor like he's a kids’ cartoon character. A hallucinatory and hysterical central sequence sees the entire cast don ludicrous animal heads (designed by Gilmour again) that are more Masked Singer than Inland Empire - heartthrob Tom Hiddleston spends a decent chunk of the show as a big-tongued, sad-eyed dog. There is a scene where cut outs of Loki and Captain Carter – IYKYN – are deployed, to joshingly meta effect.
There will undoubtedly be people who hate all this and complain at how far we’ve got from trad Shakespeare. Certainly Dogberry fans should be warned now: Lloyd has totally cut your favourite bungling constable character. Still, even the most ardent traditionalist would concede that the line speaking is beautifully lucid throughout.
And truly - it is very funny, it looks incredible, and if Lloyd has festooned it in millennial silliness then I guess what’s actually more significant is the way he, Hiddleston and Atwell have teased the Beatrice-Benedick romance into a poignant story about middle aged loneliness and being left behind as your friends settle.
Indeed, in a hipster way it’s a very middle aged show generally, with a nostalgic ‘90s dance soundtrack, allusions to the glory days of Ibiza club culture, karaoke, dad jokes, dad dancing, etcetera. In a way, Hiddleston’s performance is daring simply for how aggressively uncool it is, how much he owns being a middle-aged dad here. Might this be off-putting to younger audiences? I don’t know! But speaking as somebody whose birthday falls more or less slap bang in between Atwell and Hiddleston’s, I absolutely felt this production in my bones – an immaculate and hilarious synthesis of naffness and cool.
