Review: THE KNIGHT OF THE BURNING PESTLE, Barbican Centre

In 1607 Francis Beaumont was about to premiere his new play The Knight of the Burning Pestle, the pastiche that was set to change British comedy forever. It sees a bunch of audience members taking charge and invading the stage, dissatisfied with how the show they're watching is developing. Cheek by Jowl's current touring collaboration with Moscow Pushkin Drama Theatre is a revisited version of the piece.

Presenting it in Russian with English surtitles, director Declan Donnellan moves the action to the 21st Century and unabashedly and hilariously makes fun of a certain genre of European theatre. He cuts the original material short, bringing it to a snappy hour and 40 minutes of cheeky modern language that clashes with the austere text of The London Merchant, the nestled play.

The staging vividly recalls the wave of director-lead productions that uses live video and style experiments to impose the obscure idea of an enigmatic kind of theatre. "It's a concept!" director Tim (Kirill Sbitnev) screams at the Grocer's Wife (Agrippina Steklova) before indulging the couple and their puerile grandson Rafe's (Nazar Safonov) fancies.

The company plays with reality, blurring the lines between audience and players in a delightful exercise of suspension of disbelief. The blend between the real world and fiction carries on on the stage too: the cast of the show-within-the-play is detached and dramatic, trying to deliver their poignant and dramatically heavy script only to be interrupted or distracted by the irreverent trio. Dressed in colourful attires, the grocers comment loudly on performance and plot driving the troupe to the brink of a breakdown while Tim grapples with Rafe's acting choices.

The show is entertaining in its chaotic nature and becomes a curated parody on many levels. In a day and time when everyone and their uncle think they can do everybody's art jobs, the narrative is exceptionally funny with its tongue-in-cheek attitude to the theatre universe and je-m'en-foutisme towards its unspoken rules and conventions.

One could reproach them that such events could never take place in real life due to the fact that stage management or security would probably shut them down immediately as they storm the scene, but it works well within the fictional bubble.

The cast is sharp and versatile, snapping in and out of the more dramatic mise-en-scène as they're heckled by the hilariously annoying couple. Steklova and Alexander Feklistov (who plays the Grocer) are adorably bumbling but unafraid to unsheathe their claws. Sergei Miller and Andrei Kuzichev (Venturewell and Humphrey respectively) stand out juggling irony and depth deftly among the exquisitely talented actors who work in a close-knit ensemble.

Nick Ormerod's set design frames the action with black and white lines, sleek and stylish to go with the costumes of The London Merchant but that acts like a minimalist canvas for the gaudy trio who takes over the plot. The Knight of the Burning Pestle is a joy to watch as well as a proper belly laugh in all its eccentricity and cheek.

The Knight of the Burning Pestle runs at Barbican Centre until 8 June.

Photo credit: Johan Persson

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