Elizabeth & Raleigh : Late but Live
Dominic Maxwell, August 5th - The Times - *****
Having successfully turned Johnson and Boswell into stand-up comics at the Fringe last year, the writer Stewart Lee has now tried the same trick for Elizabeth I and Walter Raleigh. Simon Munnery goes from Johnson to a queen in whiteface and wig. Miles Jupp becomes the breech-wearing explorer-cum- spy-cum-poet from Budleigh Salterton. The result, sad to say, is an undernourished hour that might muscle its way into your affections in a smaller, scuzzier room, but which looks stiff as an iron ruff in the Cow Barn.

Some, mostly solo, moments shine. Jupp, a revelation as Boswell, again gives plenty of fizz as his historical figure-turned-compere: “Without the potato, your Scottish national diet would consistent solely of alcohol and cigarettes.” Elizabeth's withering addresses are the highlight, even if Munnery might as well be delivering them in his League Against Tedium persona: “To the Italians I say this: Rome wasn't built in a day. Perhaps it could have been if you hadn't been so busy speaking with your arms.” But Elizabeth and Raleigh plays like a polished first draft waiting for its big idea to reveal itself. They stick galleons on their heads to depict a naval battle, but this cute, Thunderbirds FAB-style staging is undermined by their awkwardness with the props. Raleigh's thwarted designs on his queen is conveyed in fairly generic master-and-servant badinage. Without more connection between the players the show trails off badly. Even Jane Watkins's period music sometimes only adds to the stiltedness.

There are some great ideas buried in here. “When I was 3, my father had my mother killed,” Munnery announces. “Is it any wonder that I have commitment issues?” But a few great lines, a nice slide-screen cameo by Jimmy Carr and a bit of tomfoolery amid the crowd add up to neither a proper play nor a jamboree. Owen Lewis's production will surely loosen up as the month progresses.