SOURCE: Shuttleworth, Ian. “Actors Survive the Gimmicks.” Financial Times (21 January 2000): 9.

In the following review of Stephen Pimlott's 1999 staging of Antony and Cleopatra for the Royal Shakespeare Company, Shuttleworth describes the performances of the four principal actors as “first-rate,” but he judges the production itself to be unimaginative.

Steven Pimlott's RSC production of Antony and Cleopatra, which has now entered the Barbican repertoire from Stratford, shows all the defects of Director's Theatre: its strengths are almost entirely those of acting, its weaknesses those of conception.

Alan Bates rumbles and shambles wonderfully as a bibulous Antony who is all too conscious that he has seen better days. So insecure is he, even about his place beside Cleopatra, that Bates's Antony not only has the messenger from Octavius whipped rather than accept his terms of surrender, but then tortures him with repeated, sadistic attentions to the stripes on his back.

Frances...