Twelfth Night review, the Barbican – New take on Shakespeare’s tragicomedy is completely intoxicating

There’s a delicious, haunting air of melancholy to the RSC’s spellbinding production of Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night. Yes, it’s Christmas, and boughs of twinkling greenery deck the stage. But with the festive boozing and carousing comes cruelty, grief, yearning and all the other messy human emotions that spill out after a drink or two. Director Prasanna Puwanarajah’s take on this tragicomedy seeps across the stage with a measured boldness that’s completely intoxicating.

He’s found a persuasive, original re-reading for almost every character in this story, highlighting all the weirder, queerer bits of Shakespeare’s text rather than rubbing them away. When Viola’s shipwrecked in a strange land, she dresses up as a man to protect herself. But Gwyneth Keyworth’s subtle take on the role suggests that she finds more than just safety in men’s clothes: they suit her forthright, unfrilly personality, and give her a new freedom to discover her desires. She woos the sad, black-clad countess Olivia on behalf of her master Orsino (the louche, velvet-clad Daniel Monks) but things don’t go to plan. Freema Agyeman has a captivating, commanding energy as this noblewoman who won’t be a pawn in anyone’s game, and uses her eloquent body to convey desires of her own.

The comic scenes are equally original here. Michael Grady-Hall is a standout as clown Feste, who feels like the night’s unofficial host: he chucks balls into the audience, gets them hyped up for the moment where the Barbican’s legendary electric doors close after the interval, and beautifully serenades everyone with composer Matt Maltese's moody ballads of late nights and heartaches. Demetri Goritsas plays Sir Andrew Aguecheek like a loose-limbed American showman, a sunny contrast to Joplin Sibtain’s strikingly bleak take on Sir Toby Belch: he’s not just a bilious comedy drunkard, he’s a shambling, shuffling, ruined alcoholic. Samuel West’s turn as Malvolio is still darker. His utterly hilarious appearance trussed up in bondage-esque yellow cross-gartered stockings is straight out of The Rocky Horror Picture Show, but it’s much harder to laugh when he turns into a furious, vengeful creature – a monstrous thing brewed in last night’s party punch bowl.

A gigantic, intricate and fully operational organ supplies both this production’s soundtrack and its visual masterstroke: it’s exhilarating to watch this story’s crew of tipsy roustabouts climb up amongst its gleaming pipes, making mischief. James Cotterill’s design sits so comfortably in the Barbican’s giant, modernist, copper-toned auditorium that you could believe it lives there all year round: so it’s a shock when it’s whisked away, to be replaced by a muddied bank of yellow primroses, or a great emptiness that descends as suddenly as a winter storm.

In common with the playful Feste, Puwanarajah is a bit of a juggler. He’s moved this play’s comedic notes around, making us laugh with ad libs and visual gags, while the traditional funny business is transacted with new solemnity. That brings a kind of slow ponderousness to some of its scenes. But the payoff is worth it: a finale that exposes all the human emotional messiness underneath Shakespeare’s seemingly neat happy ending. Like a final glass of wine by the fireside, this is a production to savour.

At the Barbican until 17 January