SOURCE: Macaulay, Alastair. “Rylance's Cleopatra Fails to Match His Female Peers.” Financial Times (3 August 1999): 14.

In the following review of Giles Block's 1999 production of Antony and Cleopatra at the Globe, Macaulay commends Mark Rylance's performance as Cleopatra for its liveliness and spontaneity. Although the critic lauds Block's movement of the host of characters around the stage, he laments what he sees as the lack of any new perspective on the play itself.

Well, OK. The new production at Shakespeare's Globe of Antony and Cleopatra—with the much-anticipated casting of Mark Rylance as Cleopatra—really does have its merits. Not only is the Egyptian queen the best role that Rylance has yet given the Globe audience, but more importantly, Giles Block's staging comes nearer than anything hitherto to managing to make that audience take Shakespeare seriously.

You wonder in advance, of course, if Rylance will be either too effeminate in...