All the Devils are Here: How Shakespeare Invented The Villain
created and performed by Patrick Page
Directed by Simon Godwin
DR2 Theatre
February 10, 2024
Production website
💉💉💉💉💉 out of 5.

All the Devils are Here

This masterpiece of theatre takes its title from The Tempest, in which William Shakespeare famously wrote, “Hell is empty and all the devils are here.”  And the magic of the night is that we get to see all of devils in Shakespeare’s world played out by Patrick Page, a master actor with one of the most beautiful bass voices with academically brilliant commentary in chronologic order.  I loved it!!!  Time flew in the theatre!  The space was very small, the props and stage effects were almost non-existent – it truly was just the actor, stage and audience.  As a one man show, it is much more than a mere collection of villain monologues; it’s a crash course in Shakespeare—showing us how he created these corrupt, covetous, conflicted, and just plain evil characters, and how his villains evolved as he progressed as a playwright.