National Theatre Live: Julius Caesar (TV Movie 2018)

National Theatre Live: Julius Caesar: Directed by Nicholas Hytner, Tony Grech-Smith. With Ben Whishaw, Michelle Fairley, David Morrissey, Adjoa Andoh. Caesar returns in triumph to Rome and the people pour out of their homes to celebrate. Alarmed by the autocrat’s popularity, the educated elite conspire to bring him down. After his assassination, civil war erupts on the streets of Rome.

“This production of Julius Caesar has a grunge band, as if it was Seattle in 1990. The text is cut: the shorter length condensed action and made it an entirely different work, not the original source, but merely based on. u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eIt was not a representation of ancient Rome, not that the play is either historically accurate nor authentic, ( no one ever said Et tu…) but the relationships had been changed fundamentally from the play by Shakespeare to something like a contemporary dictatorship in which grunge still rocks. u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eThe problem is that the production is not really the source play. It is full of tricks and distractions and that works for an audience, but it is not the original play. That is not necessarily bad but like the trade descriptions act to describe any product, cereal, or a car, it is not what is advertised. The hardest justification is cutting the text because the text is what someone pays to see and hear hence the cuts have a very large effect.”