Issue 13, 2009
Prompt Corner
Normally I try to hide apologies away at the bottom of this column, but when a mistake, however honestly made, turns out to be as misleading as the one that occurred last issue with some of the Cherry Orchard / Winter’s Tale reviews, it’s only decent to alert you. I’m afraid that, last issue, we inadvertently mis-credited Michael Coveney’s review in the Independent, Benedict Nightingale’s in The Times and Claire Allfree’s in Metro to each other. Apologies to all of them, and to you for any confusion we may have caused. The three reviews in question are reprinted at the back of this issue, properly credited.
I also have to apologise to David Eldridge for my remarks in this column last issue, in which I inadvertently misrepresented the situation surrounding his play M.A.D. I’m positive I didn’t conjure up my beliefs at the time about David sharing biographical similarities with his protagonist, but he reminds me that we’ve been over the subject before and there was no published source for my inferences. It remains one of those mysteries.
Incisive
Oh, well, sometimes I’m defiantly out of step with other reviewers. On other occasions I seem to be a step behind. I was far less impressed by Alexi Kaye Campbell’s The Pride than most of my colleagues, but I am if anything keener than most on his Apologia. It’s a conventional enough premise, and its final act is rather programmatic in engineering a succession of duologue scenes, but the language and characterisation are beautifully done. In the central role, Paola Dionisotti deploys that marvellous combination of which she is such a consummate mistress: alternating the appearance of scattiness with a fiercely incisive way of interrogating other characters. Dionisotti is, I think, destined to be the actress of her generation most wrongfully overlooked by our national honours system: she deserves to become Dame Paola at some point, but alas, she won’t. And despite that clunky final phase, I came out of the Bush saying that it would be a good year if I saw a better new play. (It is indeed a good year; I write this column a couple of hours after having seen Jez Butterworth’s Jerusalem, whose reviews will be reprinted next issue.)
Steven Lally’s Oh Wel Never Mind Bye also deserved more than the pair of reviews it received. I manage to visit the Union Theatre far more seldom than I would like, but am immensely glad that this was one of those too rare occasions. the play was publicised as being “about” the death of Jean Charles de Menezes, but as both Michael Billington and Andrew Haydon say, it is more truly an indictment of contemporary news journalism, at both an operational and a cultural level. I have little to add to their remarks, except to single out for praise Benjamin Peters’ performance as news editor James. I think I noticed one misjudged moment, which felt as if it had been imposed rather than growing out of Peters’ own take on the character; for the far greater part, he gave an excellent rendition as the cold kind of tyrant – not a sadist or an impassioned maniac, but a stressed functionary. I would hate to be on the receiving end of bile such as James’s.
Haemorrhoids
In contrast, pretty much everyone knows that “Anastasia screamed in vain.” Mick Jagger covered the salient details of the Romanovs’ death in a few words in “Sympathy For The Devil”, and Heidi Thomas does not significantly add to the picture in the two and a half hours of The House Of Special Purpose, (the name given by the Soviet revolutionary authorities to the building in which the Tsar and his family were held in Ekaterinburg in 1918) at the Minerva in Chichester. Thomas provides incident and characterisation: Anastasia is the family joker; her sister Olga’s view of the world has been tainted by her rape by the soldiers transporting her as a prisoner; the haemophiliac Tsarevich Alexei is so self-indulgent in his ill-health that he would try the patience of a panoply of saints. Two of the daughters form attachments of differing kinds (and degrees of requital) to a couple of the contingent guarding them, and we also get a little by-play about the Tsar’s haemorrhoids and a Rasputin gag or two.
But none of it seems to add up to anything in particular. More to the point, nothing of substance comes of a plot strand concerning a note smuggled in to the family from supporters promising imminent rescue, nor of the suborning by the Cheka of one of the women who visit the house to report on the goings-on among both the Romanovs and the garrison. We draw inferences from the sudden disappearance of certain figures (“volunteered for the front,” the family are told without regard to plausibility), but it all seems dramatically undervalued. The problem is not that we know exactly where the play is going – towards a volley of gunshots in the offstage basement – but rather that despite our knowledge it doesn’t feel as if it is going anywhere. Matters are not helped by a televisual scenic structure (Thomas won a clutch of awards for her TV adaptation Cranford) and too-busy, too-frequent set changes in Howard Davies’ staging and William Dudley’s design. Adrian Rawlins as Nicholas does a fine job of being personably royal, making himself politely affable even to his jailers, and Clare Holman is never vexed beyond the bounds of decorum as the Tsarina. Kate O’Flynn’s Anastasia finds liveliness and relief where she can, and Kieran Bew is touching as a laundryman-turnedrevolutionary. But there is no impression of any compelling reason to tell the story; Anastasia’s final offstage screams are after all in vain. And what’s puzzling me is the nature of Thomas’s game.
Ian Shuttleworth | ian@theatrerecord.com
At the Back
At the Back does not appear this issue
Reviewed in issue 13, 2009: |
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London |
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APOLOGIA New play by Alexi Kaye Campbell |
Bush |
22 Jun |
18 Jul |
702 |
AVENUE Q Transfer of musical by Robert Lopez and Jeff Marx, book by Jeff Whitty |
Gielgud |
30 Jun |
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718 |
CARRIE'S WAR Revival of adaptation by Emma Reeves from book by Nina Bawden |
Apollo |
24 Jun |
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712 |
THE CASE New play by Alan Atkins (Donkey Work) |
Oubliette |
22 Jun |
27 Jun |
719 |
DANCES FOR A LOST TRAVELLER Four pieces by Signdance Collective |
Warehouse Croydon |
24 Jun |
12 Jul |
722 |
EVERYTHING MUST GO Collection of short works by various writers (se review pages for full details) |
Soho |
25 Jun |
4 Jul |
716 |
Greenwich + Docklands International Festival |
Various |
25 Jun |
28 Jun |
721 |
HANJO / HELL SCREEN Revivals of plays by Yukio Mishima (StoneCrabs) |
Oval House |
18 Jun |
4 Jul |
715 |
LAUREL AND HARDY Revival of play by Tom McGrath |
Jermyn Street |
1 Jul |
18 Jul |
720 |
MEDEA/MEDEA New version by Dylan Tighe of play by Euripides |
Gate |
23 Jun |
18 Jul |
721 |
MINCEMEAT Revival of play by Farhana Sheikh (Cardboard Citizens) |
Cordy House |
18 Jun |
12 Jul |
700 |
THE MONSTER UNDER THE BED New play by Kevin Dyer |
Polka |
6 Jun |
25 Jul |
701 |
MOONSHADOW New play by Steve Hennessy |
White Bear |
25 Jun |
19 Jul |
722 |
MUCH ADO ABOUT NOTHING Revival of play by Shakespeare (Antic Disposition) |
St Stephen’s Church |
25 Jun |
19 Jul |
722 |
OBSERVE THE SONS OF ULSTER MARCHING TOWARDS THE SOMME Revival by Frank McGuinness Hampstead |
23 Jun |
18 Jul |
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709 |
OH WELL NEVER MIND BYE New play by Steven Lally (Upstart Th) |
Union SE1 |
18 Jun |
4 Jul |
706 |
PROJECT X New piece from story by Brendan Wyer (Love & Madness) |
Riverside Studios |
1 Jul |
25 Jul |
717 |
RATTLE OF A SIMPLE MAN Revival of play by Charles Dyer (Ian Dickens Prods) |
New End |
23 Jun |
5 Jul |
719 |
THE SOUND New play by David Mercatali (Merco Prods) |
Blue Elephant |
18 Jun |
11 Jul |
706 |
TOM TOM CREW New piece conceived by Scott Maidment |
E4 Udderbelly |
22 Jun |
19 Jul |
705 |
ZANNA, DON’T! Revival of musical by Tim Acito (Wild Oats Prods) |
Upstairs at the Gatehouse |
9 Jun |
5 Jul |
704 |
Regions |
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EVERY TIME IT RAINS New play by Rupert Creed |
Hull Truck |
19 Jun |
4 Jul |
731 |
THE HOUSE OF SPECIAL PURPOSE New play by Heidi Thomas |
Chichester, Minerva |
30 Jun |
22 Aug |
725 |
THE HYPOCHONDRIAC Revival of play by Molière in new version by Roger McGough (ETT) |
Liverpool Playhouse / touring |
23 Jun |
18 Jul |
731 |
OKLAHOMA! Revival of musical by Richard Rodgers & Oscar Hammerstein II |
Chichester Festival |
24 Jun |
29 Aug |
723 |
THE PIANIST Revival of piece conceived by Mikhail Rudy |
Manchester, Royal Exchange |
18 Jun |
27 Jul |
728 |
PRIVATE FEARS IN PUBLIC PLACES Revival of play by Alan Ayckbourn |
Northampton, Royal |
24 Jun |
11 Jul |
733 |
ROMEO AND JULIET Revival of play by Shakespeare (Ludlow Festival / Northcott, Exeter) |
Ludlow Castle |
22 Jun |
4 Jul |
731 |
THE TAMING OF THE SHREW Revival of play by Shakespeare (Bard in the Botanics) |
Glasgow, Botanic Gardens |
26 Jun |
11 Jul |
733 |