DESIGNER RICHARD NEGRI

"A good set will create a world which enables the play to happen fully and convincingly on all levels, whilst good costume will clarify the strong individuality of the various characters" Richard Negri interviewed by Simon Trussler, Plays and Players, May 1964.

The 1961 production of As You Like It reunited the creative team of director Michael Elliott , designer Richard Negri and lighting designer Richard Pilbrow, all of whom had worked previously on Ibsen's Brand at the Lyric Theatre, Hammersmith.

The set for the 1961 As You Like It was inspired by an old tree in Richmond Park, where director Elliott had taken his family for a picnic. He returned later with Negri and insisted he sat under the tree. For the production, a huge oak tree stood at the top of a steeply raked stage, dominating both Duke Frederick's court and the pastoral idyll of Arden. Scenes played at different levels and projected images recreated dappled light in the forest or the grille of an iron gate in a courtyard.

FOCUS ON A SCENE: Act 3 Scene 2

"I will speak to him like a saucy lackey, and under that habit play the knave with him." Rosalind

This scene takes place in the Forest of Arden where a pining Orlando has been hanging poems to Rosalind from the trees.

Corin and Touchstone discuss the differences between the court and the country.

Rosalind discovers Orlando's poems which Celia and Touchstone ridicule.

They draw off when Orlando arrives with the melancholic Jaques, who eventually leaves the young man alone.

Rosalind, disguised as Ganymede, introduces herself to Orlando and tells him how she can cure his lovesickness.

In the next gallery you can see relevant prompt book pages with stage directions, revealing how the scene appeared in production at the Aldwych Theatre, London, in 1962.