[Exit Marlowe from the shadows]  

By Steven Green, artistic director Fourth Monkey

Christopher Marlowe and William Shakespeare were very much contemporaries and collectively – along with many others – are responsible for our fascination with both Elizabethan and Jacobean theatre.

One of the obvious reasons why Marlowe has not achieved the same level of attention as Shakespeare is that he has a much smaller canon, as a result of his untimely death at just 27. I guess that is part of the reason he got lost behind Shakespeare. It is such a shame because the pieces he has left behind, his legacy, are absolutely fabulous pieces of theatre – gutsy and strong.

Marlowe was a very controversial figure. Without getting bogged down in the authorship debate, if he passed when they say he did, he left at a time when his work was on an upward arc. The fact Shakespeare is so prominent is sad and often overlooks work that is possibly better. Some of Marlowe’s stuff challenges Shakespeare’s work in terms of being more accessible to young actors in particular; his language is more direct and is the key to unlocking the door to that period of work, rather than being a hurdle that is one of the perceived problems Shakespeare presents to young actors.

The plays are constructed in a much more straightforward way; and the language is more direct – the text and narrative are more explicit and easier to get a handle on. What he does very beautifully – obviously what Shakespeare is all about too – is playing the big emotions, the big stakes, which allow the massive issues in his plays to be explored and presented.

Marlowe’s language allows you to get to the nuts and bolts of the emotions – he’s quite explicit about what he’s talking about; and it’s easier to grasp. Looking at the earlier pieces, we can see that Shakespeare’s work is better constructed but something about Marlowe’s work is gutsy: the stuff he was writing about was so challenging and really controversial.

I first saw Faustus when I was 16. I was studying GCSE drama and it wasn’t on the curriculum – I just took myself to the local theatre which was unusual in itself and I really enjoyed it.

We are taking on three plays for this season: Faustus, because we had to – for personal reasons and because it’s an important piece of work; The Massacre at Paris, which we’re performing in Canterbury Cathedral and because of the resonance of the story to the region and The Jew of Malta because it’s a lovely play and rarely done. The chance to perform The Massacre at Paris in the Cathedral is weird and wonderful and terrifying.

It came about as a result of our connections with the Marlowe Society, which is supporting our work, and its link with Canterbury’s Marlowe Theatre.

For us, the bigger picture is to try to develop our work and maybe to get Marlowe back in schools and on the Curriculum by reinvigorating his reputation with the younger generation, which sits well with The Marlowe Society too. We were also trying to find a way to mark the 450th anniversary of Marlowe’s birth in a way that we wouldn’t be eclipsed by the Shakespeare anniversary.

So we really are looking at it again – thanks to our wonderfully eccentric director Ailin Conant who is really breathing new life into Marlowe’s work. We’ve never been gender blind: so we’ve got a female Faustus and Mephistopheles and it works, it’s fascinating. Ailin has set it in a hospital so Faustus is a literal doctor.  There are such poor roles for women and so we thought there was no reason why this approach shouldn’t work. The Massacre of Paris is big and wonderful, full of blood and guts; it’s fast-paced, loud and quite frenetic. I’m fascinated to see how it works in the cathedral. When you look at Marlowe’s productions they tend to be done traditionally, whereas Shakespeare is done all over the shop, so we’re hoping this season will help to change that!

For details about Fourth Monkey’s work visit: www.fourthmonkey.co.uk To find out more about The Marlowe Society click on to www.marlowe-society.org