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Kathryn Hunter in Timon of Athens. (Photo: Henry Grossman)
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In Shakespeare’s late, one-of-a-kind tragedy
Timon of Athens (now generally accepted by scholars as a
collaboration with Thomas Middleton, co-author of
The Changeling), a wealthy Athenian given to displays of
staggering generosity whose fair-weather friends deny him when he runs into
deep financial trouble turns his back on his city and goes to live in a
cave. It’s a fable, but still the protagonist’s personality change is so
extreme that, for modern audiences at least, I can’t imagine how it would
work without a strong psychological reading of his character. When
Simon Russell Beale played it at the National Theatre
eight years ago under Nicolas Hytner’s direction, Timon’s excessive benevolence was provoked by a
desperate need to have people like him, so his eviscerating bitterness in
the second half played as fury at being deprived of what he had worked so
hard and so continually to secure.
Simon Godwin’s new version, which he
staged with the Royal Shakespeare Company and has imported to Brooklyn for
Theatre for a New Audience, lacks any real explanation for the shift except
for the narrative circumstances – and they aren’t enough to make the play
work dramatically.
