It's difficult to mar the grandeur of Shakespeare's most sweeping, lyrical and romantic tragedy. But director Steven Pimlott and his stars, Alan Bates and Frances de la Tour, seem to be trying their level best to do just that. De la Tour has been acting on the RSC's mainstage for nearly as many years as Cleopatra lived. When she bared her breast to apply the fatal asp, my pulse didn't quicken one iota.
Meanwhile Bates's Antony could never be roused to greater majesty than Rumpole at the Bailey -- and wasn't looking much sexier. Still the Bard's language indomitably weaves its spell, and Malcolm Storry offers mighty compensation in the subplot as a most soldierly Enobarbus. But when the sight of Enobarbus pounding his chest in self-reproach turns out to be a highlight, a production of A&C has serious problems. This one is not worth the train ticket to Stratford-Upon-Avon.
