'The RSC's rumbustious and passionate new staging... this is quite simply a glorious compendium of stories and poetry... a terrific team effort... hilarious... well worth the pilgrimage to Stratford'
DAILY MAIL
'Wickedly entertaining and vividly versatile... Mike Poulton's extremely adept and faithful adaptation... directed with huge flair by Gregory Doran, Rebecca Gatward and Jonathan Munby... a battery of theatrical techniques (hilarious puppetry... eerily eloquent shadowplay) is deployed with a terrific sureness of touch'
INDEPENDENT
'It's impossible not to warm to a company tackling such a wide variety of roles with such brio... highlights include Dylan Charles who plays the Pardoner as an unforgettable louche and predatory homosexual... Christopher Godwin as a peculiarly disgusting dirty old man... and Barry McCarthy as our likeable host'
DAILY TELEGRAPH
'With blood-curdling composure Paola Dionisotti delivers the Prioress's story... [she] rivets the attention whenever she's on stage... as does Claire Benedict, whose Wife of Bath radiates greedy, enveloping pleasure... Mark Hadfield as a rueful, canny Chaucer behaves as if the stories took place in spite of him... indeed, as staged here they feel as if they have bounced out of the ether'
OBSERVER
'Bawdy marvellous... everything you could desire from a night of 14th century fun... antic merriment that overspills the stage, infectious as bubonic plague, invigorating as a pinch from a passing squire... it's worth saddling up for - five stars'
SUNDAY TIMES
