Chichester Festival Theatre 1983

As You Like It

Jonathon played the part of Orlando

As You Like It' is the happiest and arguably the most entertaining of all Shakespeare's comedies. It is a play for all tastes and on the surface has all the ingredients of the perfect romance - a beautiful and clever heroine; a strong upright hero; an unjustly banished duke; a pastoral idyll; a variety of other love affairs and happy endings all round with even the villains seeing the error of their ways. But there the similarity to a fairy-tale finishes.

While the plot of  'As You Like It' is of course important, it is not the most important thing. For here is true comedy with high spots of biting hilarity where the humour is elegant but never bland, vulgar or rollicking.

It is most Mozartian in its elegance and style, not intended to be taken too seriously. The play opens with Duke Senior usurped by Frederick, his younger brother in exile in the Forest of Arden. There he has set up a small 'court' with retainers like the melancholy Jaques and Amiens. Rosalind, Duke Senior's daughter is forced to flee Duke Fredericks's court, disguised as the youth Ganymede, and goes to Arden to find her father. With her goes Duke Frederick's daughter, Celia, her cousin and dearest friend, who is disguised as Ganymede's sister Aliena, and Touchstone the court jester. Orlando, cruelly misused by his brother Oliver, also makes for Arden where all the exiles meet up, together with the forest locals.

Rosalind, already in love with Orlando, sets out to 'cure' him of his love for her while disguised as Ganymede. Celia falls in love with the reformed Oliver, and the headstrong shepherdess, Phebe, gets over her love for Ganymede and accepts Silivius' proposal. Touchstone marries the country wench, Audrey. The villains are reformed. Duke Senior is restored and Orlando reclaims his birthright. Altogether a happy ending.