Coriolanus (Bell Shakespeare) ★★★★

Written by William Shakespeare. Bell Shakespeare. Neilson Nutshell. 20 Jun – 19 Jul, 2025.

Bell Shakespeare strikes gold with their timely staging of Shakespeare’s Coriolanus, only the second time it has been produced in the company’s history.

Rome is in turmoil as famine grips the republic, and the upper-class patricians and working-class plebeians are turning on each other. Meanwhile, a neighbouring tribe, the Volscians, is rising up against Rome. Into the fray steps war general Caius Martius (Hazem Shammas). After turning back the Volscians, he is renamed Coriolanus, after the Volscian city of Corioli that he captures. The patricians urge him to run for consul, but to win the votes he must gain favour with the plebeians whom he openly despises. When two plebeian tribunes, Brutus (Marco Chiappi) and Sicinius (Matilda Ridgway), stir up the people against him and conspire to have him exiled, Coriolanus is enraged. Turning his fury on Rome, he joins forces with the very Volscians he once defeated to mount an attack on the city.

While Coriolanus may be a relative stranger to Australian stages, it’s received considerable attention in the UK, with recent major productions starring Tom Hiddleston and David Oyelowo — both critically acclaimed. So it makes sense that Bell Shakespeare has spiced up their season with this bloody political drama. The rise of overly emotional autocrats in the real world certainly doesn’t hurt either.

You know you’re in safe hands with Shakespeare’s text when the likes of Peter Carroll (as elder patrician Menenius), Brigid Zengeni (as Coriolanus’ mother Volumnia), and Marco Chiappi (as tribune Brutus) take the stage. With a cast this strong — including Anthony Taufa, Suzannah McDonald, Septimus Caton, Gareth Reeves and Jules Billington — Shammas has the space to make Coriolanus a deeply unlikeable protagonist we can’t wait to see fail.

There’s no love lost for the haughty patrician class who seek to push and manipulate the people, but things aren’t as cut and dried as good versus evil. Carroll’s Menenius delivers withering lines about the rabble-rousing tribunes, as both sides wield populism in a bid for control. This morally murky play offers no admirable heroes — even if you sympathise with the plebeians, you’ll still shake your head at their giddy overreach.

Peter Evans directs this traverse production as a constantly shifting balance of control. The simple set features a moving platform the cast slides up and down the space, adding dynamic movement and weight. Location names are projected onto the floor in animated text transitions, filling the room with motion even when the stage stands still.

But don’t assume this is a Shakespearean tragedy full of doom and gloom. While, yes, there are plenty of deaths, Evans and the cast find moments of levity and comedy. Jules Billington opens the show with a brisk pre-show talk and Acknowledgement of Country that is both educational and inviting.

If I had to pick a fault, the only moment that didn’t quite ring true for me was [spoiler alert, BTW] Coriolanus’ eleventh-hour change of heart. I just didn’t buy that he cared enough about his wife and mother to be swayed from his prideful anger.

After a few years of relying on the big-hitting classics, it’s refreshing to see Bell Shakespeare bringing us one of the Bard’s lesser-staged works. While I could happily go a few years without seeing another Hamlet, Macbeth, or Romeo & Juliet, I definitely want more of these relative rarities.