Review: Roaring girl comes out on top

The Roaring Girl, being staged by the RSC at the Swan Theatre in Stratford, is part of a season of Elizabethan and Jacobean plays with big parts for women.

The play by Thomas Middleton and Thomas Dekker is a Jacobean comedy which follows feisty Moll Cutpurse who cuts down all those who cross her.

The character of Moll is based on Mary Frith, a notorious 17th century underworld figure who wore men’s clothes and smoked a pipe.

Director Jo Davies has staged this version in Victorian London with plenty of music and dancing. It is a rip-roaring production with a crazy climax involving elderly men doing handstands and dancing like teenagers. The all-female band livens up proceedings throughout the show.

Lisa Dillon, as Moll, steals the show with an energetic performance. Dressed in men’s clothes, she sports a thin moustache, smokes and struts arrogantly around the stage. But mainly she aims to outwit all the men who get in her way and completely underestimate her.

There are hilarious moments, especially involving Timothy Speyer and Lizzie Hopley as Mr and Mrs Gallipot whose domestic rows spice up the show.

Peter Gawthorpe