Productions » Knight of Malta
By John Fletcher, Philip Massinger and Nathaniel Field
Manoel Theatre, Valletta, May 2003
Directed by Chris Gatt
This play was commissioned by the Manoel Theatre Management Committee.
This is a Jacobean era stage play, which first appeared in print in 1647. Set during the Great Siege of Malta, it is a tale of love, honour and deceit. The beautiful Oriana, Grandmaster La Valette’s sister, is courted by the Knight Mountferrat against his vows of chastity. When she rebuts his advances, he vows to destroy her and accuses her of plotting with the enemy against the Order of St John. Two of Oriana’s other suitors, desperate for her hand, fight to save her.
Set in modern-day Valletta, this contemporary version of the play searches for the Baroque in modern-day Malta, superimposing current political and cultural thought onto the seventeenth-century text to provide a fresh reading of the play.
(Photography : Darrin Zammit Lupi)
