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Dr Faustas
Dr Faustus
21st October 2009
When my English class was told that we were going to see a performance in College of Dr Faustus by a travelling theatre company, my expectations did not match what we actually saw. For instance, based on the gloomy and mysterious opening scene of the play which we had read in class (and which, along with Wuthering Heights has single-handedly washed away the last sleepy clutches of summer holiday spirit to be replaced by the fascinatingly melancholic world of the gothic), I was expecting a portrayal of the intensely self-conceited protagonist in a somewhat more ravenous light and even (though probably a product of my own beliefs) a heroic figure, championing the emergence of 16th century atheism into a modernised context.
However, the refreshingly comic interpretation of the script was far from a disappointment. It was brilliantly acted with a professional fluidity that more than anything gave us an overview of the play allowing a general perspective to develop before we dive into the labyrinth of different readings of Christopher Marlowe’s piece over the course of the year. I did feel, though, that this performance was perhaps of greater interest to the Theatre Studies students rather than English students, because it was more a piece of fantastic acting and an imaginative adaptation, rather than a ‘warts and all’ staging of Marlowe’s play. In places it allowed witty comedy to take over deeper readings, so much so that at times it felt like ‘Faustus made easy’, notably by using puppets of Ernie from Sesame Street to represent the good and evil angels rather than a genuine dramatisation, and this I feel defeated the gloomy essence of the play. Despite this, it was really entertaining and powerfully portrayed the naivety of the megalomaniac gothic hero - and certainly made me re consider my immediate perception of the play.