Author: Tom Williams

Things are looking pretty swell for King Ubu after the revolution, but once he begins extorting taxes from his citizens and killing off all contenders to his authority, Baseboard flees to Russia to enlist the help of the czar. War breaks out against the two countries, and the Russians and Fols meet upon a hill for a standoff in which soldiers portrayed by life-sized puppets flood the stage. The whole war sequence seems to last forever (in a good way)—until an immense stuffed bear charges in and nearly ends Ubu’s existence. He escapes, but his crown is lost and he and the missus must sail away into exile.

In direct-address to the audience, Emilie introduces the notable figures in her life, narrates some events, and introduces other events as scenes in which she and the others act out the “drama.” “Drama” gets scare-quotes here because what drama there is often gets choked by the narrative framing. Apart from a few surprising scenes of real emotional vehemence, the scenes of drama that pop up mostly come across as simple banter or conversations between characters who feel more like ideas of historical figures than real humans: in other words, they have no psychological depth.

The press release describes this production as “An irreverent comedy that imagines Shakespeare’s ‘lost years’”—the years for which we lack historical record of his life and activities—“as a rousing romp through the streets and across the stages of Elizabethan London.” To that, I chuckle. “Romp” is fitting, but surely “irreverent” is a misnomer: something so inane and infantile cannot possibly bear the prestige of “the irreverent.” We must hold to some standards.