EDINBURGH 2010: BWW Reviews: THE MERRY WIVES OF HENRY VIII

The Merry Wives of Henry VIII seemed like the type of show which had plenty of material ripe for loving parody. While I could see the type of show they were trying to achieve, unfortunately I don't think that they actually pulled it off.

The style of the humour is quite gentle, although conversely the jokes weren't always delivered with the subtlety when that's what was called for. The overarching weakness of the show is that the tone is inconsistent. It's not clear whether it's supposed to be more of an informative show with some gentle humour added in to keep you interested (something akin to what you'd get from a T.I.E. production), a complete parody purely for entertainment's sake, or a drama (as suggested by the very serious and slightly over the top moments dropped into the middle of the predominant light-heartedness).

In general the show does have merit - the people in the audience with me seemed to be enjoying it (although I wouldn't say that the show would be everyone's cup of tea), there were some good performances and some jokes that were delivered spot-on, and with some development the more specific flaws in the writing could be fixed. But the main area of work needed is with the aforementioned issue of general tone, because until then it will most likely get a mixed response from an audience who weren't quite expecting what they got.

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