Issue 23, 2009
Prompt Corner
What a lot of ill feeling there seems to be in the air. I don’t intend to dwell on the spat between myself and Tim Walker which has been dubbed “Haystacksgate” and featured now in the Guardian, Independent and Evening Standard, except to note that my prediction of last issue regarding Tim’s review of The Habit Of Art was not fulfilled (although I wonder whether it would have been had I not made the same prediction public on a blog before the Sunday Telegraph went to press). Then Ian Hart blows his top during and after a performance of Speaking In Tongues – see opposite – and finally Timberlake Wertenbaker accuses critics of being drunk after the Evening Standard theatre awards when they turned up to review her play The Line at the Arcola. However, it would be more appropriate to comment in detail on this matter next issue, when those reviews are reprinted.
Muddle
Perhaps the climate of grumpiness has seeped into my bones, but on the subject of The Habit Of Art I feel that most reviewers have been rather too indulgent of Alan Bennett and his play. Readers with good memories may recall that when Bennett’s last play The History Boys opened at the National in 2004, I pointed out how big a muddle it was in terms of chronology and the architecture of the world of the play, so to speak; however, I argued that this did not in fact prove crippling to either the play’s argument or its spirit. On this occasion, though, I fear that a similar mess does fatally damage Bennett’s entire dramatic project. Lloyd Evans presents his theory in his Spectator review, perhaps unaware that Bennett had admitted precisely that some weeks earlier in the London Review of Books – http://www.lrb.co.uk/v31/n21/alanbennett/alan-bennett-writes-about-his-new-play.
He had originally set out to write a play entitled Caliban’s Day about an imaginary late reunion between W.H. Auden and Benjamin Britten but, finding the material dramatically intractable, decided to frame it as the play-within-a-play, being run through in a rehearsal room: this is the final form of The Habit Of Art. And I’m afraid that, to me at least, not only the blatancy of the device but also the desperation which motivated it are conspicuous. There are a number of moments at which the discussion of art and its relationship with life clunks horribly in Caliban’s Day; Bennett, unable to digest these matters theatrically, instead deploys one of the conjuror’s tricks, misdirection, by writing some deliberately atrocious segments; having permission to wince and laugh at these, we forget our discomfort with the way the actual dramatic meat is cut and cooked. Or so runs the theory. Well, it didn’t work with me. I find The Habit Of Art not a work of delicious and playful complexity, but rather a candid admission of inability to shape the intended material and of dramatic hopelessness.
Pain
I have further reason for complaint regarding Mike Bartlett’s Cock. (The Royal Court cannot help but know that it has licensed several weeks of such schoolboy remarks, although Lloyd Evans is mistaken in his assumption that the title causes embarrassment amongst customers which harms sales; the entire run sold out with extreme swiftness.) I adore Miriam Buether as a designer, but in this case she had remade not just the playing area but the auditorium and seating, and done so in a way that took me so far beyond discomfort that, after nearly an hour and a half in a cramped, un-ergonomic position, my back and sciatic pain had increased to the point where I nearly passed out. This is not an exaggeration. When the play was over, I had to wait a couple of minutes until I was sure that my legs were steady enough to take me down the few steps to the door of the Upstairs space. No doubt I’m in a small minority, but I think still a statistically significant one.
As for the play itself... well, let me dispel the clouds of curmudgeonliness. I have often twitted Quentin Letts in these pages, but all credit to him for being the only reviewer to mention one of the salient points about the concept of the play’s staging. Buether’s set is, he notes, “like an old-fashioned cockfighting pit.” Immediately the picture becomes clear. There’s so much more to the title than puerile penile punning. The players circle each other in the arena as fighting cocks do before engaging; they never make serious contact because it would be impossible to present, not just the acts described, but the savagery of the conflict underlying them all. The chimes which so puzzle Paul Callan are signalling not new scenes, but new rounds or bouts. It’s all about confrontation. It would probably be reading too much into things, though, to note that Ben Whishaw’s character, as the only one with an actual name, is the only one who demonstrates the human desire to avoid such conflict (or, conversely, the human ability to dither). Points, too, to Henry Hitchings for noting the similarity between Andrew Scott’s performance and the onstage manner of comedian Dylan Moran.
Finally...
A remark by Max Stafford-Clark in a meeting with the Critics’ Circle, which shows a combination of self-awareness, poignancy and wryness so characteristic of both Max and his directorial work: discussing the various ways in which he has and hasn’t recovered from his stroke of 2006, he observed, “If you see a couple of characters static downstage right for 20 minutes, it’s because I lost them with my left-side peripheral vision.”
Ian Shuttleworth | ian@theatrerecord.com
Reviewed in issue 23, 2009
| Production | Venue | Opened |
Closed |
Page |
London |
||||
| ARCHITECTING English première of play by the T E A M (NTS) | Pit | 5 Nov |
14 Nov |
1204 |
| COCK New play by Mike Bartlett | Royal Court Upstairs | 18 Nov |
19 Dec |
1231 |
| FAITHLESS BITCHES New play by Harold Finley & David Turpin (Truly Fierce Prods) | Courtyard | 5 Nov |
6 Dec |
1215 |
| THE FALCON New play by David Klempner | Rosemary Branch | 11 Nov |
21 Nov |
1230 |
| THE 14TH TALE New play by Inua Ellams | BAC | 20 Oct |
31 Oct |
1207 |
| GILBERT IS DEAD New play by Robin French (Shining Man) | Hoxton Hall | 6 Nov |
29 Nov |
1206 |
| THE HABIT OF ART New play by Alan Bennett (NT) | Lyttelton | 17 Nov |
1223 | |
| I FOUND MY HORN Return of adaptation of book by Jasper Rees (Sweet Spot Prods) | Hampstead | 11 Nov |
28 Nov |
1210 |
| THE JOY OF POLITICS New comedy show by Andrew Jones and Ciaran Murtagh (The Black Sheep) | Warehouse Croydon | 6 Nov |
22 Nov |
1230 |
| THE KREUTZER SONATA New adaptation by Nancy Harris from novella by Tolstoy | Gate | 10 Nov |
19 Dec |
1208 |
| LETTING IN AIR New play by Becky Prestwich (Box Of Tricks Th) | Old Red Lion | 12 Nov |
28 Nov |
1211 |
| THE MAKING OF MOO Revival of play by Nigel Dennis | Orange Tree | 13 Nov |
12 Dec |
1219 |
| A MAN OF NO IMPORTANCE European premiere musical by Stephen Flaherty, book by Terrence McNally Union SE1 | 12 Nov | 5 Dec |
1222 | |
| THE MISANTHROPE Revival of play by Molière in adaptation by Tony Harrison (Black & White Rainbow) | White Bear | 3 Nov |
22 Nov |
1207 |
| MIXED UP NORTH New play by Robin Soans (Out Of Joint / Bolton Octagon) | Wilton's Music Hall | 12 Nov |
5 Dec |
1212 |
| OPEN YARMOUTH New play by Sally Torode | Etcetera | 5 Nov |
22 Nov |
1220 |
| PUBLIC PROPERTY New play by Sam Peter Jackson (Whippet Prods) | Trafalgar Studio 2 | 16 Nov |
5 Dec |
1221 |
| SALAD DAYS Revival of musical by Julian Slade and Dorothy Reynolds (Tête À Tête) | Riverside Studios | 13 Nov |
22 Nov |
1229 |
| SCOUTS IN BONDAGE New play by Glenn Chandler (Boys Of The Empire Prods) | King’s Head | 17 Nov |
10 Jan |
1211 |
| A SMALL TOWN ANYWHERE A new play without performers (Coney) | BAC | 19 Oct |
7 Nov |
1207 |
| THE TARTUFFE / THE TRIAL Adaptations of Molière and Kafka (Belt Up Th) | Southwark Playhouse | 12 Nov |
28 Nov |
1216 |
| A WINDOW New play by Edward Bond (Big Brum) | Oval House | 11 Nov |
14 Nov |
1234 |
Regions |
||||
| AUTOBAHN Six short plays by Neil LaBute (Th Jezebel) | Glasgow, Tron | 10 Nov |
14 Nov |
1239 |
| THE ENTERTAINER Revival of play by John Osborne | Manchester, Royal Exchange | 9 Nov |
5 Dec |
1242 |
| THE FEVER CHART New play by Naomi Wallace (Pilot Th) | York, Theatre Royal | 29 Oct |
14 Nov |
1241 |
| Glasgay! festival See review pages for full production details | Glasgow, various | 6 Oct |
8 Nov |
1237 |
| THE GOOD SOUL OF SZECHUAN Revival of play by Bertolt Brecht, adap. David Harrower | Manchester, Library | 3 Nov |
28 Nov |
1242 |
| MRS WARREN’S PROFESSION Revival of play by George Bernard Shaw (Th Royal, Bath) | Richmond / touring | 16 Nov |
21 Nov |
1244 |
| NATURA MORTE New piece by Derevo / Akhe / Conflux | Glasgow, Arches | 10 Nov |
14 Nov |
1240 |
| UP THE DUFF New play by Lisa Evans (Fresh Glory) | York, Theatre Royal | 7 Nov |
28 Nov |
1241 |
| A WEE HOME FROM HOME Revival of piece by Michael Marra / Frank McConnell / Gerry Mulgrew (Plan B) | Glasgow, Tron / touring | 17 Nov |
18 Nov |
1240 |
