I've no doubt that this Jericho House production acquired enormous political resonance when it toured recently to Jerusalem, Haifa and the West Bank. It is, after all, a play about territory, exile and revenge. Transplanted to a medieval church in the Barbican, it becomes more of a cultural artefact: much nippier, at under two hours, than the current Haymarket production but not quite as liberating as the freewheeling Korean version that came to the Edinburgh festival.
Some aspects of the play work beautifully in the church setting. Jonathan Holmes, who directed the site-specific Katrina, knows a thing or two about hurricanes, and evokes the initial tempest superbly with the aid of swaying actors and hand-help lamps. Music, composed by Jessica Dannheisser and embracing everything from whispering strings to thunderous organ peals, suffuses the whole production: nave and aisle are full of noises, and Ruth Lass's Ariel sings memorably, even lending Come Unto These Yellow Sands a distinctly Middle Eastern flavour. There are also hints, partly through costuming, that the union of Rachel Lynes's Miranda and Gabeen Khan's Ferdinand represents a longed-for Israeli-Palestinian reconciliation.
But Holmes's production has its puzzling features. Since it is part of the company's Utopia season, it seems strange to cut the visionary character of Gonzalo. Furthermore, Prospero's usurping brother and the shipwrecked drunken butler have undergone sex changes so that they now become, respectively, Antonia and Stephanie. Both are played by the admirable Nathalie Armin, but the result is confusing. You wonder why Caliban, who seems physically besotted with Stephanie, falsely claims that the only women he's ever seen are his mother and Miranda, and when Armin's Antonia stalks out of the climactic reunion, you are not sure if it's to make a point or to do a quick costume change. And, although Alan Cox's Prospero is refreshingly youthful rather than an antique schoolmaster and is a model of clear, intelligent verse-speaking, I never felt he was having to do battle with his own inner demons. Nevertheless, even if it is occasionally baffling, the production also beguiles and makes this historic church echo with the sounds of both western and eastern music.
