Bonus: Twelfth Night Wrap-up Redux
Back in 2021, we recorded our second ever wrap-up episode for our second play series: Twelfth Night. We both watched two versions of Twelfth Night: Trevor Nunn's 1996 film and She's the Man, then we also each watched an additional version. Kourtney watched the The Globe's 2012 production starring Mark Rylance, and Elyse watched National Theatre's 2017 production featuring Tamsin Greig.
But then, tragedy struck when Kourtney went to edit the episode! The audio files for the majority of the episode were corrupted and could not be used. The only usable audio was the portion of our conversation about She's the Man. So, we released what we could as our "Twelfth Night: Wrap Up" episode.
Since that day, we've dreamed about going back and revisiting the three productions that were lost to technological issues. Today, we are so excited to revisit those productions and share our 2025 thoughts with you.
Elyse (ES): Hi, Kourtney.
Kourtney (KS): Hi, Elyse. How's it going?
ES: It's going pretty well. How about you?
KS: I'm also doing well. For the listeners, this is before the holidays. Right now Elyse and I are preparing for our holiday break and so that's something that's, like, on top of mind. But by the time you're listening to the episode, I'm sure Elyse and I have had a lovely break full of rest and relaxation and then also the winter holiday’s coming up, which actually leads us into this topic that we're bringing to you today – speaking of winter holidays. But before we get into the episode, the first thing in our housekeeping that we want to do is: 2025 is coming to an end and we want to thank all of our Patreon patrons who have supported [us] during, at one point or another, or throughout the year 2025. So thanks, thanks, and ever thanks to our Patreon patrons: Katie Smith,
ES: Shelby Kalani Gage,
KS: Nat Yonce,
ES: Elizabeth Sharman,
KS: Clocky McDowell,
ES: Megan McGrory,
KS: Devin Smith,
ES: Allen Carlson,
KS: Gwen,
ES: Liz Swaffield,
KS: Kiara,
ES: Kim Swaffield,
KS: Cuban,
ES: David Weiss,
KS: April,
ES: Kara Schuster,
KS: Julie at Blue Mountain Rose,
ES: Lisa Vanderkolk,
KS: Ashton Francine,
ES: Anne Moeckler,
KS: Sujata Nigam,
ES: Sue,
KS: Kathleen Owen,
ES: Meg Helmes,
KS: Paul Hopkins,
ES: Kelly,
KS: Kinsey Simons,
ES: Jennifer Bruce,
KS: Nick,
ES: Benjamin Richardson,
KS: Michelle Buxman,
ES: Ina Carranza. Thank you, again, for being part of our Patreon community this year in 2025 and we hope that you'll join us again next year. Oh, and one last piece of housekeeping. Just so you know, all of our merch on our website is 15% off for the rest of the month of December. You don't need a code. Just head to shakespeareanyone.com backslash shop, add things to your cart, and the discount should automatically apply at checkout.
KS: Okay.
ES: We are doing some watches of Twelfth Nights. Kourtney, why are we doing our Twelfth Night Wrap-up again? Didn't we already do this?
KS: Yes. So Twelfth Night was our second play of Shakespeare Anyone? And we decided after Macbeth that maybe instead of just discussing different adaptations based on academic articles and little blurbs, we should watch a few adaptations and performances and discuss them. And so we did that. We watched and discussed–
ES: –four!
KS: –four, four productions. We watched and discussed the 1996 Trevor Nunn movie, the National Theatre from 2017, the Globe from 2012, and She's the Man. And if you are a longtime listener, you would know that we only released our discussion about She's the Man. And that is because early in our podcasting, I had an external hard drive that decided that, once the files were on my external hard drive, it was going to completely die on me and hold hostage these files that I needed to edit and release the episode. So, that discussion that we had–
ES: –lost to time.
KS: Lost to time, lost to an external hard drive that betrayed us and so we decided we have a bonus episode that we need to fill for the year and why not just redo that viewing and have a new discussion and bring it to all of you?
ES: Especially since, you know, since that episode, we have really solidified what our Wrap-ups are and we know that there are listeners out there who really enjoy hearing how we analyze these works, so we have gone back, not to our notes from four or five years ago, but we have rewatched them and have new notes coming from us today in 2025. Or something that we did for that episode that we haven't done since, but you never heard it, is that Kourtney watched the Globe’s, but I didn't and I watched the National’s, but she didn't. And we told each other about them. And we have since learned that we really like coming together and talking about watching the same thing.
KS: Yeah.
ES: So there are some that we are watching again, and some that we are watching for the first time.
KS: Yes. And it's also perfect because “Twelfth Night” is a reference to a medieval and renaissance, an early modern holiday, really, the Twelfth Night holiday. And so this is going to be coming out just around the Twelfth Night holiday, give or take a few weeks. So if you're feeling really inspired to celebrate Twelfth Night, maybe you'll also join us in watching some of these Twelfth Nights to prepare for the Twelfth Night holiday.
ES: So, as Kourtney said, the three productions that we are going to be discussing today are the 1996 Trevor Nunn film, the Globe’s 2012 production, and the National Theater's 2017 production. To kick things off, we are going to discuss the 1996 film directed by Trevor Nunn, which stars Imogen Stubbs as Viola, Ben Kingsley as Feste, Helena Bonham Carter as Olivia, Nigel Hawthorne as Malvolio, Imelda Staunton as Mariah, Toby Stevens as Orsino, and Richard E. Grant as Sir Andrew Aguecheek, among others.
KS: Yeah. So let's go ahead and get into the Trevor Nunn film. This film is one that, prior to us watching it in our original Twelfth Night series, I had never seen.
ES: –same.
KS: –but it's the kind of Twelfth Night that I could see a teacher in an English class rolling out the cart with the film and putting in the VHS and playing it for students or the DVDs or streaming it.
ES: –the laser discs.
KS: Yeah. It's the version that I could see teachers in English classes showing to their students because of its accessibility.
ES: Yeah. To me, it's a very... It does a really good job of melding the media of film with a Shakespeare play. Trevor Nunn really directs the heck out of this and something that I love that they do is starts with a bit of an introduction to the idea of there are these twins and that there is a shipwreck. So it starts with a ship. We're going to talk about how all these start, I think. Since that is something that productions decide to change up with Twelfth Night. So this one does start with a shipwreck, but starts even before that. And we get to see Viola and Sebastian interact together and see that they do look a lot alike.
KS: And genderbending is not new to the twins. They are performers that genderbend and play the piano and sing as lounge performers. The film is very Edwardian, perhaps. I'm not entirely sure of the exact time period, but it comes... It's very–
ES: –yeah, I would say it's Edwardian.
KS: Yeah. And then also speaking of the cinematography and leaning into that, there are so many scenes where we are shown, not told, which I think is always super effective in a film. It's a good alternative. We talked about Henry V and the chorus, and it can be kind of goofy when someone's telling you something, but also simultaneously showing you it. And it's like, in some ways, it's like if you're going to change the medium, maybe change the language or cut the language.
ES: We get a little bit of that because we skip straight to 1-2 after the shipwreck because this film makes the choice that Viola is our main character, and therefore we are going to follow Viola's point of view for a while once we introduce her. And it takes some liberties with how Orsino and Olivia are introduced and that we get to see them as the captain is talking about them.
KS: Yeah, it works. That I think is something that's very effective for this film because it feels like a film versus a play on camera. The one thing that I think prohibited my enjoyment of Twelfth Night the story is that the tone was not Twelfth Night, Shakespeare's Twelfth Night.
ES: I wrote this is a romantic Twelfth Night. This is not a laugh-out-loud funny Twelfth Night. This is if Downton Abbey did Twelfth Night or your favorite film or TV adaptation of Pride and Prejudice did Twelfth Night, or the film adaptation of The Secret Garden that I watched when I was a kid did Twelfth Night. Like it's very English countryside romance, not laugh-out-loud funny.
KS: Yeah, and then when we get to the prank plot, in some ways it feels Oscar Wilde-esque, but it's very talking head Shakespeare.
ES: Yes, I will say though, again, it works for the choice that was made of, like, if Viola is our main story, then this is how it's going to be told and this is the setting and everything cohesively works. It's not a Braungah adaptation where things are like all of a sudden… (laughs)
KS: Huge?
ES: Huge. Yes, it's actually, everything is small and sometimes even underplayed. So Trevor Nunn has done a really good job of directing his actors for film.
KS: Yeah, and I think, you know, speaking, because we have to speak about this as if it's a different medium because it's not on stage. I think it's very effective in some ways and it's a bit detrimental in other ways. Like it's really great for establishing the closeness of the characters and the intimacy and the relationship of some of these characters, especially the, like, love triangle plot. And then the part that's, to me, not as effective is the prank–
ES: –the Malvolio sub-plot.
KS: Yeah, that subplot just is lost on me because it's not over-the-top laugh-out-loud. And then at a certain point, it feels like, oh man, they're just so mean to Malvolio.
ES: Yeah, it's not the easiest to follow why it's happening. And, yeah, I agree with all that. I do think though what you said earlier of like ultimately, like if you were introducing someone or like a classroom full of people to Twelfth Night for the first time and you want to make sure that they understand, like, the core story of Viola, Orsino, Olivia, this does that really effectively and then would supplement with productions that are more laugh-out-loud funny for the Sir Toby, Sir Andrew, Feste because Ben Kingsley also is a very somber Feste and this is a piece where the mourning of Olivia's house is very present.
KS: Yeah, I agree with you that I would introduce this into a classroom with a contrasting piece that shows, like, the topsy turvyness because one of the major components is everything is topsy turvy, roles are not as they seem. The, you know, peasant is now the king and that's very absent in this. But there is a really great, like, tenderness to, like, a poeticism to this film, a romance, I guess.
ES: Yeah, it's romantic. And you do, like, root for Orsino and Viola at the end. I think it's one of the best, like, versions of the moment where he says, you know, let me see thee and thy woman's weeds, you know – your master's mistress part, you know, you actually believe that he's like fallen, that you, this Orsino is incredible is what I'm getting to is. And you really get that he loves Viola.
KS: And then at the end, we get a wedding. Everything has returned and we do see that Orsino and Viola are together. Viola is wearing her woman's weeds and they've ended up married and the same thing goes for Olivia and Sebastian. One thing I thought was strange though is that I noticed at the end of the movie with the wedding, I was like, Viola and Orsino are making out and then Olivia and Sebastian are making out. But then while each couple is making out, Viola and Sebastian are, like, holding hands? Which I like, there's a closeness to these two twins. So I will say that this production, this film, does a really great job establishing that these two are super close. I just thought it was a little bit strange.
ES: Yeah.
KS: But I don't know, maybe it's more symbolic. And that's honestly like not a big wrench in the entire film. It was just something that I saw that I was like, did you see that?
ES: (laughs) No, I didn't. I don't think I ever caught that.
KS: Okay.
ES: Well, I'll have to rewatch and find it again. Yeah. Yeah. Overall, I would say, is this my favorite Twelfth Night that we're going to talk about? No, but it might be my favorite, like, Shakespeare-to-film-adaptation that we've watched so far.
KS: Yeah, I think you might be right because I think I agree. I'm trying to go through the Rolodex of all of the Shakespeare-on-film we've watched. And it's like Twelfth Night, Much Ado…
ES: Henry V.
KS: Hamlet.
ES: Romeo and Juliet.
KS: Yeah. And I think that I agree with you that like Much Ado, well, Twelfth Night is my favorite and then Much Ado is the second.
ES: Yeah. Next up, let's talk about The Globe's 2012 production. This production was directed by Tim Carroll and features Mark Rylance as Olivia, Stephen Fry as Malvolio, and Johnny Flynn as Viola, among others. And you had seen this one before we watched it originally–
KS: Yes.
ES: –however, many years ago.
KS: Yes, I've already seen this production and I really enjoyed it when I first watched it, and I do still really enjoy it. I think it's a very enjoyable Twelfth Night. I think that there is a lot of comedy that is brought to this particular production. There's a lot of space that the actors let jokes breathe. I always love open air thrust stages for Shakespeare because I love it when actors get to connect with the audience and bring the audience in. And the thing that was missing from the Trevor Nunn was that, like, topsy-turvy social order is totally in chaos. And this one brought that. So, like, the aristocracy, you know, Olivia and Orsino and Sir Toby and Sir Andrew Aguecheek, they were all such fools. And that was a really nice contrast to me to the fool and, like, the commentary in this play about, like, wit versus fools and, like, witty fools, foolish wit. All of that really, like, shined through in this production.
ES: Yeah. I think there are a lot of good things about this production. It has moments that do make it a really solid Twelfth Night. I'm so glad that you called out Sir Toby, Sir Andrew and Feste and Fabian. I think that they are excellent comedic relief in this. I think that Olivia also has some good funny moments. Mariah for me is a highlight in this one. And I think that there's really fun staging. Toby has yellow stockings at the very beginning. I thought that was phenomenal. Such a tiny little choice. Toby has hidden alcohol. It's one of the better, like, twins costuming I've ever seen. Those two do look identical. And also good, like, boxed tree. That scene is incredibly difficult to stage to have three or four people hidden on stage while somebody else is, like, and commenting on what's happening while Malvolio is reading the letter and finding the letter. This one had a really great solution for that.
KS: And Fabian is the actor that played Caliban in the Tempest that we just watched.
ES: Whoa! I also really liked the fights. This Cesario-Andrew-Antonio fight. Olivia-breaking-up-the-Toby-and-Sebastian fight. Really funny.Some of the biggest laughs for me, personally, came from the fight choreography (or lack thereof) in both. But I do have some, I do have a couple of criticisms about this one. I think I'll start with the one that I don't think you have.
KS: Okay.
ES: I have an issue with the pace of this. I think that there are moments where the phrasing of the dialogue is interrupted for, not breath, not for something to land, but at the worst moments, Mark Rylance to just move around on stage in silence. And this is a Twelfth Night that is three hours long. And the majority of that seems to come from pacing decisions of moments in silence that are like interrupting a thought, interrupting a speech to make a very broad choice in movement or to just, like, sit in silence for a while. And for me, there's comedy that's lost in this one. To me, while it does have funny moments, it's a bit of, it's still a bit serious in some of these characters. And some of these moments are, yeah, just a little bit like, I watched it on two-time speed and there were moments that felt like two-time speed. And then there were scenes that I could listen to and they sounded like they were at a normal speaking pace. My one critique is pace.
KS: Okay. Yeah. I think that we just don't agree on the pace, which is fine.
ES: Yeah. And I think that, like, I'm saying, like, there's a difference between, like, moments where, like, something breathed and, like, we let the laugh happen. And then there's moments where the laugh only happened because we were sitting in silence for so long.
KS: Is this a majority Mark Rylance's Olivia comment? Because–
ES: –this is a majority of Mark Rylance's Olivia.
KS: –because I see what you're saying. And I know that I saw, like, self-indulgence coming out of Mark Rylance's depiction of Olivia. Like making move–like, Mark Rylance's movement was very funny upon entrance. I think the, like, there's this illusion with the dress and the way that Mark Rylance is going around the stage as if Mark Rylance is just kind of floating on stage with like tiny little walks and a dress that you can't see the feet. And it's very funny. But then that joke gets repeated often and interrupts.
ES: Yes. And I think this is also a Stephen Fry note of there is a bit that, like, is funny. He does do a funny, it is a funny bit. It's just, like, my personal taste is that it could have been tightened up a hair. My personal comedic taste is this could have been the tiniest bit shorter and it wouldn't have felt like I'm watching an actor do a bit. It would have felt like–like it could have been funnier if it was just a little quicker, if it happened a little faster.
KS: And those are the two actors too who have like out of the cast, the big ticket names, like, they're the ones that I imagine, I'm not here to make judgments on my Mark Rylance or Stephen Fry, but I could see them like milking things too long because–
ES: –or the production built it around them and around the idea that because of their celebrity, the audience would accept this. When maybe it wasn't actually the best. I think I'm going for me, a better version of this production has these moments. Mark Rylance's movement as Olivia, I enjoy it. But again, like you said, it repeats and it repeats in ways that are unnecessary. There's moments where I just let this tipped into “I'm watching an actor wait for the reaction that he wants the audience to give him”. Versus: a character is having a realization and a joke is happening. That's, again, my personal preference.
KS: I can see that because the rest of the cast, like, so much of the comedy with Sir Toby, Sir Andrew, Fabian was so tight, so clear. Mariah—
ES: Their pace is great.
KS: Yeah. Yeah.
ES: So it feels like two different shows for me. That's why I mean like the pacing?
KS: I can see.
ES: But now let's talk about the thing that we both, I think, have, which is this is an all-male cast, which is part of the Globe's original practice productions. And I think something that, on the one hand, I think is a cool thing to see once, a cool thing to have an example of what this could have looked like in Shakespeare's time. I think that 13 years later: is it effective? Is it a choice that gives us anything more than a sort of gimmick? Yeah.
KS: Yeah. I think it's an interesting novelty. And from an academic standpoint, there is language and there are moments that have a little bit of, like, oh, this could have been the joke about, you know, this is the joke about the apprentices, the boy actors that we don't get when we have a woman's body in that role. Like the buttery bar, all that kind of stuff. Like, that is something that it's, like, those are moments that are more visible with the in-joke about the casting decisions in Shakespeare's time that are academically interesting and fun to see, especially, like, as an academic being like, oh, we studied this play and we’re studying, you know, X-Y-Z or studying this time period. But it seems like that's kind of the role where it should stay is, like, this is a novelty that you can see as, like, a kind of tourism or for academic purposes. But as an actual repeated practice, it then, to me, leans into the possibility of basically having very restrictive casting. Like we're not going to see women actors, non-binary actors, they were all actors who were white. So we're going to exclude anyone who we perceive as not being originally cast in this role because we are going for this attempt at authenticity for Shakespeare's time. So I'm really glad that The Globe does not do this practice anymore. I could imagine like one run of something, but then it leans into territory that becomes we only cast this because of that.
ES: Yeah, I also think that the, as you put it, the jokes that, you know, may have originally been in there commenting on the body of a young male actor in the boys company. When you have an adult man playing these roles and you have a modern audience sitting watching, it made me wonder how many of these laughs are, you know, I don't, I don't know if the layers of boy, oh, I'm hearing language that's meant to be delivered to a boy actor is what everyone's hearing or if it is reinforcing a man in a, a man-in-a-dress-trope, which then isn't what those jokes were intended, necessarily intended to do either.
KS: Yeah, yeah. And I think it is important to note that, from my watch, I don't think that the actors playing the women roles were doing anything like, we're mocking. I mean–
ES: I think that there were some who were better at playing the character that they were playing and then there were some who may, and again, not knowing the actors, not seeing them in anything else, who may have affected some femininity when they were in their roles. I'm going to say my example of the former of somebody who just, to me, played the role as written is the actor who played Mariah.
KS: Yeah.
ES: Who deserves a shout out real quick, who would be Paul Chahidi.
KS:Yeah, I really enjoyed Mariah.
ES: To me, that was an actor playing the role as written. And Paul did things as Mariah that I was like, oh, I want to steal that when I have someone else in that role. That's a choice that anybody in that role could make. But was it a joke that people were laughing at more because it was a man in a dress? Those are the things I just kept coming back to. And that had nothing to do with Paul's performance for me. That had everything to do with like, what is this audience responding to?
KS: Those questions didn't really pop up for me quite so much. So I'd be interested to go back and watch some of the performances and, like, see, I think that, like, I saw Mark Rylance attempting to be Queen Elizabeth-esque. That was something that popped up for me. And so I saw this attempt at... So one of the things that we talked about in our original Twelfth Night series was this idea of the court being older. And there being this, like, whole new comedy that cracks open when you look at these characters through the lens of Queen Elizabeth and Robert Dudley, the First Earl of Leicester and any of Elizabeth's court, the aging court, and how foolish it is for older people to be acting so juvenile in love. And so that was something I think that this production did really well. A question is, could the same thing have happened if you have very good comedic women actors?
ES: I think yes.
KS: And I agree.
ES: And then it would not have the layer of, again, it's like, but also Mark may be doing that and, like, as people who have studied that, we may go, oh, I think he's doing that. How many people sat there and just thought he was putting on a voice and doing some funny lady stuff? Like intent versus impact with some of those choices.
KS: Yeah, yeah. One hundred percent.
ES: I mean, I totally think that somebody could steal, he's got a great, like, shoe-falling-off-bit in the second scene with Cesario and then, like, having a little, like, fit when he still doesn't have a shoe at the very end. He's got some good moments. And I do see that. I did also pick up on, like, oh, he's doing like a Queen Elizabeth I type of thing. He's trying to suggest that.
KS: Yeah.
ES: So I do think that's in there.
KS: Yeah. I guess the moral of the story at the end of this is, if you're going to make these kinds of choices, there has to be that careful consideration. There are these questions about, like you said, intent versus impact. And I would say across the board, I think that the impact was, like, low damage, but I see what you're saying. So I'm not going to, like–I don't know where to end this, but. I don't know. I feel like I had a really great time watching it. It was very, very enjoyable to me. I did so much laughing. I thought that there were some sharp choices that made what was happening super clear. One of the things that I struggle with sometimes is when I'm watching a production where I don't think the actors know what they're saying, therefore, I don't know what they're saying. And so, yeah, this one was like a very high one for me in terms of, like, enjoyment.
ES: I feel like I talked like I hated it. I did not hate it. I have strong feelings about Twelfth Night. Now, stronger feelings than I think I did even four years ago about how this play works. And I know this play really even better than I did four years ago. And I just think that like, you know, I'm reacting to, like, my own personal taste in comedy.
KS: Yeah.
ES: You know, this is not a bad production for me. It's not my favorite, I just, I wish there was more fun overall in this. Like I know it has some of the topsy-turvy. For me, there's still just like this very serious Twelfth Night. It's sort of like in the middle in terms of like goofy serious. It has its merits. There are things that, like, I would take from this one though. Yeah, it's just a bit of a mixed bag for me. That's all I'm saying.
KS: Yeah, I think there's a lot to steal from it. And one of the things that I think is a really important thing that you're bringing up is this idea of intent versus impact. The, like, consequences of deciding that you're only going to cast a certain way and you're only going to put certain bodies in certain roles and what those mean to the audience. And one of the questions that I have about this production is how much of it would have still been, like, sharp as funny as topsy-turvy if instead of casting quote-unquote original practice, if they cast really funny women in these roles or people who are not white in these roles. So it's a novelty that I enjoyed and I would watch it again. But I do not recommend that all productions, like while you can pick and choose and take jokes and blocking and things like that, the casting is the thing that for me is like, this is a novelty.
ES: This feels gimmicky. This doesn't feel, yeah.
KS: Yeah, yeah. But I still did enjoy the gimmick, but I don't recommend people today replicate the gimmick because it's limiting.
ES: Yeah.
KS: Okay, so Elyse, would you recommend The Globe's 2012 production as a view in a classroom?
ES: Personally, no. I would recommend it, like an excerpt from it, for, like, a theater history class or like a Shakespeare specific class for the purpose of seeing what original practice is. But for studying Twelfth Night, it's a hard pass for me.
KS: Okay, I would recommend, but I would only recommend it in tandem with something that's more modern, a more contemporary production to see, like, the quote-unquote original practice with something that's like a modern, more relevant production. But if I was only to pick one, I would not pick The Globe in a classroom.
ES: That's fair. I think on that note, let's pivot to our final production that we watched. This is the 2017 National Theater’s production, which was directed by Simon Godwin and features Oliver Criss as Orsino, Phoebe Fox as Olivia, Tamsyn Greig as Malvolia, Tamara Lawrence as Viola, among others. This one I watched four years ago for the first time. So this was a rewatch for me. This was your first watch of this?
KS: It was, yeah. Aside from a couple of clips that I'd seen, specifically Tamsyn Greig's Malvolia. I watched a couple of clips of that prior, but this is my first time watching it. And this production is set in a more contemporary time period, early 20th century, like, parts of it to me felt very 1920s, very Great Gatsby, very jazz. The production used a really cool stage tool, a rotating stage in order to help connect scenes and add kind of that cinematic in-between of action to help tell the story and move the story. And overall it had so much, like, it was fun. It was funny. The actors were, I knew what they were saying and I would definitely watch it again. I would recommend it. And I think it was just a, it was a success.
ES: I agree. I really enjoy this version. I think that if you're going to watch a staged version, this is about as good as you can get. This, as you said, feels very contemporary. It feels very accessible in terms of the language, in terms of the storytelling. That set is incredible. And I think that Tamsyn Greig does an incredible job as Malvolia.
KS: Yeah. Yeah. She's my highlight in the cast.
ES: I think this is, for me, out of all the ones that we watched, this is the one where I understand why Malvolia or Malvolio is hated by everyone. Like, there was something I didn't mention about the Globe’s was there's a moment where somebody went “aww” for Malvolio and I was like, oh no, the audience likes Malvolio.
KS: Yeah.
ES: And with this one, you completely understand that this person is an annoying stick in the mud.
KS: Yes. This one really links in the Twelfth Night dialogue that may or may not have existed, whether you know it or not. Again, the audience that is seeing this probably doesn't know the things that we or other scholars know, but this Puritan Malvolio or Malvolia, but, like, the absolutely unbearable, menacing, wet blanket Puritan Malvolia comes across from beginning to end. And you don't really feel bad for her at the end. Like, she got what was coming to her. I mean, I will say they have a very long, like, moment with Malvolia at the end that, in some ways it's like, oh man, like, I feel not “aww”, but I feel like, damn, damn, like what is she going to do?
ES: I think this one shows me that your Feste really has to deliver some of those final lines about “thus the whirligig of time brings in his revenges.” That has to be so clear that, like, this is all because Malvolia, Malvolio was rude to Feste at the very beginning. That's the one time where we see Malvolio really insult somebody, say that Feste is not good at his job. And then that's an inciting incident for this. And we know that because Feste brings it up, quotes it at the end, back at Malvolio. And this Feste does a really good job. And this Feste is, I didn't mention it earlier, but Dune McKitchen, really good job of making that very clear.
KS: Yeah, I enjoyed this Feste. And there was a lot of natural integration into music, of music into this production. And Feste had like a, they utilized music and, like, what can a musical clown be in, like, the 1920s? I will say, the one thing that I've noticed from so many Twelfth Nights that is a struggle for me, and this one unfortunately does do that, is that it opens with the dramatization of the shipwreck. And for me, when it starts with the shipwreck, it takes a few scenes for the comedy to come back because it's so intense. I just saw the Folger’s back in May, and they also started with the shipwreck. And so rather than starting with 1.1 with “if music be the food of love play on” where Orsino is being over the top and dramatic, and just like a total, not a [expletive] boy, what is he? He's more like a…
ES: Himbo.
KS: A himbo. But when the play starts with a shipwreck, for me, it feels like it takes a few scenes for the tone to get out of drama into, like, this is funny.
ES: Yeah, it puts us into the top of The Tempest versus the top of this play, which is “if music be the food of love play on.” I agree. I think the only one for me that it really works for is the Trevor Nunn film, because we get to see even more before that. And so we understand.
KS: Yeah.
ES: And we are also not, like, watching it live. Watching it live is very different.
KS: Yeah.
ES: I would agree that I don't think it's necessary to start with a shipwreck. I think that, especially the way that this production does the introduction of Viola, that she's in a hospital bed and wakes up and says, “what country friend is this?” I think that's a very valid choice. And we would have gotten a sense of what happened to her, even without the actual staging of the wreck.
KS: Yeah, yeah. But this production gets on track with tone in terms of the comedy. And Cesario and Olivia are so funny together. Olivia really picks up her comedy. And it's so funny to see this kind of erratic Olivia, who's just, like, head over heels and cannot control who she cannot control herself. I wish that she was performing this in an open air thrust, so she could really play with the audience. Also in the “I am the man” speech, this Viola omitted the line about being a poor monster, which I thought was a great choice, especially when we think about how sometimes people do that, like. What is it that Dr. Sawyer Kemp says?
ES: Pants not trans.
KS: Yes, yeah. And so I thought it was a good choice to not have Viola use that kind of language while dressed as Cesario. Yeah. And for me, this Orsino is my favorite. He's like a 40-year-old bachelor who is... I think I just wrote down “Orsino is 40”. And I feel like that explains so much about who Orsino is. Because they have a scene where it's his birthday, and he has a button that says–
ES: Big 4-0 or something like that.
KS: Yeah, something like that.
ES: Yeah, Oliver Criss, we also enjoyed him in A Midsummer Night's Dream. He was Oberon.
KS: Oh, I love when things come together with different actors. And Toby and Andrew are so funny. They have great chemistry. The dancing, the galliard was so funny. Both Sir Andrews in the Globe and in the National are, like, highlights for me because they really lean into just how oblivious Andrew is. And it's really effective.
ES: I also think that we have a great Fabian in both, which is a part that I sometimes see combined with other parts because it's this guest in Olivia's house who shows up very late in the structure of the play as an additional person who's been wronged by Malvolio. So to have just, like, two really good ones in two different productions is incredible. And a big highlight for me in this one is the letter scene. Malvolia is annoyed by the audience giggling at their anticipation of the “her Cs, her Us, her Ts, and thus makes she her great Ps” joke. You just see Malvolio trying to get them to be quiet and not giggle while she's trying to read. And it's a really good joke. Like, she sees what's going on. She's just like, oh no, don't laugh. Stop laughing. Which again, like an open air space would be really cool to see that much interaction with and could have gotten such bigger laughs.
KS: Yeah. And then they do a great job of showing the hypocrisy because as soon as she realizes, oh, you know, it's not real, but she thinks this is about me. Then she starts, like, getting in the fountain and like they have a fountain with running water on stage and, like, celebrating. And it's that, you know, the Puritans are not so much different than merry England. They're just a bunch of hypocrites who they're no better than any of us. They just pretend like they are.
ES: Yeah.
KS: This one was way more gay than the other two.
ES: Overtly gay Antonio.
KS: Yes. And Sebastian and Antonio shared a kiss early on. That was a reciprocal kiss. Also the ending leans into Orsino being bisexual, is what I got out of the ending. But I wish that they had explored that a little bit more early on. Orsino and Viola is always difficult for me because, even though they end up together, they spend far less time together on stage. And so the actors have to really work to make us go, oh, that makes a lot of sense. Besides just saying, I wish I were his, you know, his mistress.
ES: Yeah, they've got one scene where you can see them being in love with each other, which is the... And it's, of course, the scene where he's, you know, in this one, it's his birthday party. But it's where he's talking about how, like, women don't love as much as men do. And she has to be in love with him and deliver the “Patience on a monument” speech and say that, like, women love just as hard. And, like, you have that. Like, that's the scene that you have to really…
KS: Yeah.
ES: And there's a song in there. So they used it very well to, like, give those two a moment while the song was happening. But yeah, you've got very little time to convince the audience that these two are in love and denying it.
KS: Yeah, yeah.
ES: Okay, Kourtney, would you recommend the National Theatre's production of Twelfth Night in a classroom?
KS: Yes, absolutely I would. I think this is, of the three that we watched, the one that is the most relevant and the one that I think students will connect to the most and they'll see Shakespeare as alive and something that they can adapt… in the future.
ES: I agree. I think that this one is the most fun, which is also important to consider when showing students Shakespeare, is that it can be fun.
KS: Yes.
ES: Well, typically we go through and do our, you know, mashup of our dream version. What would it be?
KS: We could do main characters and then, like, a couple of subplots.
ES: Sure, right off the top, favorite Viola.
KS: The National.
ES: For me, it's a tie between the National and the Trevor Nunn film. Favorite… let's also do Orsino and Olivia.
KS: Orsino, the National. Olivia? I hate to say it, but none of them were my favorite.
ES: Mm…
KS: I think that there's parts that I want to combine of the National and the Globe. Because I liked the National’s. She really played into how erratic Olivia becomes when she falls in love, or thinks that she's, when she falls in love with Cesario. But I wish they had solidified more her power in the house, which they did in the Globe. Like, there's this, because of the topsy-turvy-ness, you know? And I felt like Mark Rylance's Olivia, though self-indulgent, you could see, oh, this is the person who is the head of this household. And the National didn't have that kind of status amongst her house. Which means that that contrast, I wish that we could, like, mash up the contrast in my… does that make sense?
ES: Yeah, yeah, I understand that. I think for me, the National wins out because for me, her house is already topsy-turvy and she's already lost control of it because Sir Toby and Sir Andrew are doing whatever they want. So I don't mind it as much. But yeah, I think that's a really good point, though of, like, a combination of the status of one and the zaniness of the other would be a great combination for an Olivia. Speaking of, I'm gonna kind of lump them together because I think they are, I think this subplot works best when you look at them as a unit. The Sir Toby, Sir Andrew, Mariah, Feste, Fabian grouping.
KS: My favorite for that grouping is the Globe.
ES: For me, it's the National and the Globe. I would do a sort of, like, mix and match of them. I would take the Mariah from the Globe and put that characterization of Mariah in with the National and enjoying them for different reasons.
KS: Oh, they're both great groupings.
ES: Both great groupings.
KS: Yeah.
ES: So and then… Sebastian and Antonio.
KS: Okay, so my favorite Antonio is from the National, but my favorite Sebastian actor is from the Globe.
ES: I'd agree with that.
KS: Yeah. So I would like to mash them together and then make it still very gay.
ES: Yeah. I also really enjoyed the Sebastian at the Globe. I thought he was very clear.
KS: Yes.
ES: And I would do the same thing. Keep it gay.
KS: Yeah.
ES: And last but not least, I believe, the Sea Captain. No, I'm kidding. (laughs)
KS: (laughs) Yeah. I was like, hold on. What?
ES: Malvolio, Malvolia.
KS: The National, Malvolia.
ES: Same. Tamsyn Greig all the way.
KS: Yeah. Yeah. I think Stephen Fry is funny, but I think that Tamsyn Greig just understands the contrast of Malvolio's Puritan hypocrisy. She understands. And it's so menacing. So scary And she deserves what she gets.
ES: And then so also she goes so broad. We didn't talk about it, but her yellow stockings and cross-gartered is a striptease, like, a burlesque striptease number. And so you really get just how extreme this idea is.
KS: And I think that goes to what I like about the Twelfth Night and what I want from Twelfth Night is that topsy-turviness, like the total contrast so we can see just how ridiculous everyone is being. And then Feste is like the sane one in the household. Yeah.
ES: And then I just love, speaking of that, I love the fun that The National has. To me, I feel like I'm watching actors who really know the play and really know what they're saying, have the facility to play. And like, it looks like they are actually having fun. And so that just ups the fun that the audience is able to have with it as well.
KS: Yeah. And how can you not have fun when the Elephant is turned into a nightclub that ends up having a drag queen singing a musical version of a Hamlet's soliloquy? How can you not enjoy that?
ES: Yeah. Just to wrap up, I'm so glad that we went back and watched these. It was a delight to revisit them. And maybe we should redo Macbeth too, because we never watched anything for that.
KS: No, I think that would be a fantastic future bonus. Oh, and listeners, enjoy your Twelfth Night holiday.
ES: Well, it'll be a couple of weeks.
KS: Well.
ES: But yes. Thank you for listening.
Shakespeare Anyone? is created and produced by Kourtney Smith and Elyse Sharp.
Music is "Neverending Minute" by Sounds Like Sander.
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Works referenced:
Carroll, Tim, director. Twelfth Night: Live from Shakespeare’s Globe. Performance by Stephen Fry, and Mark Rylance, Electric Sky, 2012.
Godwin, Simon, director. Twelfth Night. Performance by Tamsin Grieg, et al., National Theatre at Home, 2017, https://www.ntathome.com/products/twelfth-night. Accessed 2025.
Nunn, Trevor, director. Twelfth Night; or What You Will. Performance by Imogen Stubbs, Helena Bonham Carter, and Ben Kingsley. Entertainment in Video, 1996.
