REVIEW: Sh!t-Faced Shakespeare Present: The Taming Of The Shrew - Leicester Square Theatre, London.

Sixty minutes, six classically trained actors, three bottles of Stella Artois, and one seriously drunk member of the cast. What could possibly go wrong? Well as it turns out, a whole lot goes right instead. There’s nothing quite like drunk comedy, and this company have managed to perfect just that. Though 'The Taming Of The Shrew' is one of the few Shakespeare plays I am not familiar, I’m pretty sure that this one-hour drunk retelling is the best version I will ever see.

With audience participation and more unpredictability than a drunk uncle at a christening, Sh!t-Faced Shakespeare has truly reinvented the Bard. This is truly comedy at its finest. No matter what show you watch, it’ll always be different, and with two bars beside the stage this is more like a fabulous pub gig than a formal theatre show. It’s safe to say that I learnt and understood more Shakespeare in one hour than the whole course of my GCSE English (I’m sorry, Mrs. Cross).

As the play begins, we are introduced to sisters Kate and Bianca. With the recent death of their father, they have discovered that his will requests that the selfish and spoilt Kate must be wed before the gentle Bianca is able to find herself a husband. Everything seems perfectly normal. It’s a Shakespearean comedy, two young men (the rich Lord Lucentio and his manservant) plan how they will win the heart of dear Bianca. Then, however, a young man stumbles onto the stage backwards. It appears we’ve found our drunk for the night. What then ensues is one hour of drunken commentary, cheering, dancing, and general tomfoolery. As it turns out, a drunken actor is incapable of getting through three lines of dialogue before either losing his place or perhaps deciding that they are better off just giving us jazz-hands. Truly, I can’t tell you much about the plot of The Taming Of The Shrew, but I can tell you what a man looks like after consuming two thirds of a litre bottle of gin to become drunk enough to think that walking backwards is a skill worthy of applause. And frankly that will stick with me for longer than any sonnet ever could.

Reviewer - Aidan Bungey
on - 25/4/19