QUEEN Elizabeth I graciously presides over the Masque which BOAT are presenting this year, re-creating a similar entertainment to that which Her Majesty may have watched in January 1601. Whilst the weather was hardly wintry, the island’s peacocks added a certain regal feel while mummers, including St George, the dragon and Father Christmas, performed for picnickers prior to the play itself.

Denise Mallender’s lavish and stunningly costumed production is full of fun, even down to sound effects that might usually be executed offstage - the storm that causes the shipwreck, a chiming clock – performed by players in full view.

The audience is immediately brought into the play’s action by the winks and asides of the cast, swelled by a group of fine guitarists and numerous non-speaking attendants. There is so much to enjoy, whether the superbly acted comic caperings of Sir Toby Belch (Frank Holden), Sir Andrew Aguecheek (Paul Mole), Maria (Janet Chiesa) and Feste (Tony Ashton) or the confusion of Viola (an impressive Lisa Maule) and her brother Sebastian (Andy Dickinson).

But the evening’s undoubted highlights come in the outstanding performances of David Weeks as a hurt, misunderstood Malvolio and Elaine Kennedy-Day as the Countess who he believes is in love with him. They are two sparkling jewels in a highly polished crown.

Linda Kirkman
Courtesy of the Bournemout Daily Echo