smokingboot

That was the deal in the court of Oberon and Titania; 90s party-goers with members of Little Mix and the cast of Mad Max thrown in here and there. Russell T Davies' addition to the Beeb's Bardic celebrations needed nothing but glow sticks and a tardis. I enjoyed it,though I'm not sure Nonso Alozie's warmly poetic Oberon really needed to fire random lazer beams up into the night sky, or that Maxine Peak's Titania had to be so testicularly obsessed. The actress spoke no two lines to our donkey man without pausing suggestively, rolling her eyes, or touching his [pause... breathe heavily...move hands over Matt Lucas' body...] tail. Or something else just as [pause... lick lips...trickle fingers...] heeyoooj. No innuendo was left unturned. Bottom's bottom was one of the most unsafe body parts I have ever encoutered courtesy of the BBC. The juice from that pansy turned Titania into such a fairy-bestiality porn punter that even when the spell ended,I still wouldn't trust her in a farmyard.

Anyhooooo, natch, Davies' hobby horse appeared in familiar glory. This production didn't suffer for it, in fact it kind of matched the classic Elizabethan genderbendery frisson and the sense of fairy waywardness, lasciviousness and chaos. But I do wonder about Davies. Was he a virgin before Dr Who? Cos he acts like he just had sex for the first time last week and he's dying to tell everyone about it. He's on the verge of getting tedious - but not quite yet. It was a cute clever production with a few too obvious tropes. Every time Matthew Tennyson's Potteresque gap year Lysander appeared I wanted to shout,'You're a wizard,Harry!' at him.

A more serious problem could have been the addition of super heavy elements * about Theseus being a proper - and very nasty - tyrant with Hyppolyta as his prisoner bride. Due to a magical twist and a plot that had nowt to do with Shakespeare's original, it all worked out fine, but it was weird to see these humans we were supposed to like being favoured collaborators(?) alongside such an unpleasant character. Still, the fairies made everything right, and the feel good factor at the end was amazing. So hey,not perfect, but still a lot of fun. http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b07dx7lt/a-midsummer-nights-dream

* Yes, I know. RTD's not the only one who can be too smart for his own good.