Antony and Cleopatra
1981: Jonathan Miller

This is the BBC Shakespeare Plays version. As such, its production values are modest, but it gives a good deal of attention to the text, and the performances are of the highest caliber.

Colin Blakely’s Antony is somewhat softer and more approachable than either Heston’s lapidary hero or Richard Johnson’s complex and conflicted Roman who has “gone native” in Egypt. Here we see Antony more as a man caught by his appetites and circumstances in a situation far out of his depth. He lacks the gravity of the other two, but his internal reflections seem (to me) to be more genuine than theirs. It’s a performance crafted (in the best sense of the term) for the small screen.

There is something about Jane Lapotaire’s delivery of her lines that seems a mite on the whiny side, and I personally don’t find that very appealing. Then again, I’m not a huge fan of her work as Lady Macbeth either: there’s room for different opinion. Certainly she has the ability to create a nuanced performance, but on the whole I prefer Janet Suzman’s version or several of the others.

As in a number of performances, Enobarbus is worth watching: his character is intrinsically so volatile that it can be played in a thousand different ways. Emrys James manages to craft a persona that is simultaneously intriguing and slightly repellent. Charmian seems more worldly and less vulnerable than some of the others one can see.

All in all, I think this is not the best version of the play available, and certainly not at the pinnacle of the BBC project. It is nevertheless easily good enough to justify the time and effort to watch it, and it will definitely shed light on the whole.

Buy the complete BBC Shakespeare Plays at Amazon. Note that this will require a Region 2 player or a region-free player: it will not play on most normal American DVD players. Nevertheless, the price is so reasonable that even with a region-free player thrown into the deal, you’ll come out ahead.

Buy the BBC Shakespeare Plays Tragedies Giftbox at Amazon. Unlike the complete series, this is in a North American video format, and it includes five plays: Antony and Cleopatra, Coriolanus, King Lear, Timon of Athens, and Titus Andronicus.

Buy the complete set of the BBC Shakespeare Plays or individual plays (including this one) in Region 1 format direct from Ambrose Video.