Heavy weather on stage

How sad it has to end like this. After thrilling takes on, among others, Hamlet, Henry V and Olivia in Twelfth Night, that remarkable performer Mark Rylance bows out after a decade as the Globe's artistic director with two of the biggest disappointments to hit Bankside's wooden stage.

He is already starring in a preposterous version of The Tempest for three actors plus dancers, and now comes another squall-ridden shambles, a new verse adaptation of Plautus's Roman comedy, The Rope, by Peter Oswald. Oswald's miserable concoction is small part Pericles-meets-The Tempest, small part A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum - and large part mess.

As if aware that this piece would struggle even in the silly season of panto, Rylance seems to have given up trying to project properly. The result is that his explanatory prologue, intended to fill us in on the back-story of renounced fortunes, kidnapped daughters and bartered prostitutes, is largely unintelligible. All we can do is study the strange dancers, back again, and the musicians who appear to be dressed in shower curtains and bath hats and count the minutes until the interval.

As in The Tempest, Rylance plays a variety of parts, from grieving father to scheming pimp, all of them with dubious accents and skimpy costumes that revolve around boxer shorts. He sings occasionally, invites some audience participation and ad-libs morosely, pointing out the script's deliberate anachronisms. Postmodern or not, it's certainly postamusing.

The rest of the cast in Tim Carroll's production are clad, school-play-style, in sheets representing togas and caper gamely in front of an enticing backdrop showing a beach with a caryatidadorned temple. This Sanctuary of Venus is, in fact, a key element of plot resolution for spirited prostitute Palaestra (Emma Lowndes), but as nothing in the script has prepared us to care for any of the characters, an opportunity for genuine emotion is passed up.

James Garnon gives a sweet turn as the lovelorn, freedomseeking slave Sceparnio, but this is far too little to prevent shipwreck for The Storm.

The Storm