When director Marion Potts looks at William Shakespeare’s As You Like It, she sees more than a 16th-century pastoral comedy – she sees the thematic DNA of modern reality television franchises like Love Island.
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she → look → Island
“People are falling in love at first sight.
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People → fall → sight
There are betrayals, jealousies, recriminations and confessionals,” says Potts.
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Potts → be → ?
“There’s even an exile that feels like an eviction.
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that → ’ → eviction
I began thinking, my gosh, there are really close parallels with reality television and what it says about popular culture.
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it → begin → culture
That’s where the play became truly fascinating for me, exploring that heightened, performative reality the characters inhabit.”
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characters → ’ → reality
Potts returns to direct As You Like It for Bell Shakespeare’s 2027 season, marking the company’s first staging of the 1599 work in 12 years.
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You → return → years
Next year’s line-up also features a “dark and dangerous” 90-minute adaptation of Measure for Measure, directed by Saro Lusty-Cavallari.
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up → feature → Cavallari
As You Like It follows exiled nobles escaping court corruption into the Forest of Arden.
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You → like → Arden
Free from rigid social constraints, they undergo unpredictable romantic entanglements.
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they → undergo → entanglements
“It’s liberating and incredibly freeing, but they’re also in freefall,” Potts says.
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Potts → ’ → freefall
Both the Elizabethan court and modern reality television construct hyper-gendered environments where men are expected to be buff, women hyper-feminine, and everyone preens for courtship.
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everyone → construct → courtship
Potts’ production avoids a literal time and place.
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production → avoid → time
“If anything, it’s set in a world where concrete reality and mediated reality are confused,” he says.
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he → set → world
“A world not unlike our own, where characters are in constant performance as though they’re being watched, even without cameras.
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they → watch → cameras
“It taps into the troubling phenomenon of identity construction, vanity, status anxiety and ‘youthaholicism’ – exploring the blurry line between truth, fake truth and self-deception.
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It → tap → truth
That distortion gives rich scope for satire, mirroring the culture of Instaworthy photos, cosmetic surgery and influencers.”
This pop-culture exploration arrives at a pivotal moment for Bell.
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exploration → give → Bell
Facing post-COVID instability, shifting audience habits and severe financial pressures, theatre companies confront a landscape where audiences are risk-averse, booking late and demanding familiar entry points.
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audiences → face → points
Bell Shakespeare artistic director Peter Evans acknowledges these realities, stressing the company is charting a path to absorb rising production costs without scaling back.
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company → acknowledge → costs
“We are unwilling to employ fewer artists or do less work,” he says.
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he → employ → work
To secure long-term stability without compromising artistic scale, the company is launching a permanent financial endowment.
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company → secure → endowment
By preserving the principal investment, annual interest will be reinvested directly into programming.
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interest → preserve → programming
To keep houses full, Evans is leaning into traditional stagings with commercially savvy crossover productions.
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Evans → keep → productions
Building on the success of 2022’s pop musical The Lovers, the company is bringing back Mackenzie.
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company → build → Mackenzie
It now returns for an extensive three-month national tour alongside main stage runs in major capital cities and the Sydney Opera House.
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It → return → cities
“To see the play packed in with people aged from 16 to 30, repeat customers, is a huge win, and I would say quintessentially part of Bell’s mission statement,” Evans says.
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Evans → see → statement
For Potts, bringing a 21st-century lens to classic texts honours Shakespeare’s inherent flexibility.
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bringing → bring → flexibility
“Shakespeare’s work exists to be performed, defined by its poetic breadth,” she says.
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she → exist → breadth
“The plays are not museum pieces – they remain dynamic vehicles that reveal profound truths about contemporary life.”
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that → remain → life
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it → get → ?
The Aporia
