Fun amid the trees

The darkly cavernous Courtyard may not appear to be a promising setting for a magical comedy most of whose action occurs out of doors. Sunlight and banks where the wild thyme grows can be encountered elsewhere in Stratford, but not here.

In deciding to emphasise the terrors of Night, rather than the sweetnesses of Midsummer, Greg Doran has found a treatment of Shakespeare's comedy that is in every sense spectacular, though often more nightmare than Dream. It makes the most of all that this temporary theatre has to offer. A menacing blood-red moon, among a brilliant throng of starry lamps, overhangs the stage, slowly changing colour and shifting across it in the course of the evening. Everything is distantly reflected in a mirrored backdrop on which vast shadows appear, such as that of the satyr-like Puck (Mark Hadfield) administering love-juice. The night-time wood, with its brambles, mosquitoes and hidden horrors, is performed by the fairies, a motley troop of urban Goths who move as a single menacing mass bearing old rags and coat-hangers. Their collective energies threaten the four upper class twittish lovers, who are painfully at sea, especially the gawky bespectacled Helena (Natalie Walter). But there is simple comedy in the constant sparring of Lysander and Demetrius, and their speeches in rhyming couplets are very well delivered. It was also fun to see, spilled out on stage, all those "knacks, trifles, nosegays" with which Lysander has allegedly "bewitched" Hermia.

We are more cheerfully grounded in the company of the mechanicals, who whizz on and off stage with a clanking mass of shopping trolleys and bicycles. They are led by Joe Dixon's Brummie Bottom, a bumptious would-be scene stealer. His range of ridiculous movements and gestures, including amazing ass-human hybrid noises, is irresistible and never irritating. He is this Dream's earth-bound star. Things are also held together by a charismatic and forceful Oberon (Peter de Jersey) and a light sparkling Titania (Andrea Harris). These are magical beings to whom children familiar with Narnia or Hogwarts will respond immediately. The many special effects, including aerial flights, songs, dances, mime, and enjoyable eclectic music (Paul Englishby) are perfectly done. The pace is almost as speedy as that lightning flash to which Lysander compares happiness in love, and there is so much going on all the time that we are sure to miss some of it.

The tragical farce of Pyramus and Thisbe lifts everyone's mood as it should, perfectly moderating the dark and bitter elements in the play. This production, first seen in 2005, was well worth revising and reviving.