The Duchess of Malfi - The Old Vic - April 9

The air was clouded by incense, the scent of which wafted by my nose, as the audience waited for The Duchess of Malfi by John Webster to begin on April 9, a soggy London evening, at The Old Vic. The theatre is legendary; not quite 200 years old and so many name changes and closures that it could make a person’s head spin. This is a serious theatre – imagine the auditorium and stage in thirds, the surface area of the stage alone seems to be one third of that space – backstage is a very long way back.

The set was atmospheric: all in rich hues of burnished bronze and brown-black wood. It immediately creates a sumptuous mood and the lack of light brings an undercurrent of the sinister with it. Mark Bonnar’s character of Bosola starts out as a principled man, but quickly becomes Harry Lloyd’s Ferdinand’s creature. Bosola even calls himself a “true servant and an honest man”, which explains his moral dilemmas succinctly. Ferdinand is a nobleman, as is his brother, the lecherous Cardinal (played by Finbar Lynch), and the title character, the Duchess of Malfi, his sister (played by Eve Best).

I’d never studied the play before and I always thought the Duchess was the evil one – turns out, it’s everyone of status BUT her. The language, though not difficult (the play was written in the first quarter of the 17^th century), is very lyrical – it seemed all metaphor, allegory, and simile to me. In the hands of a less skilful director* and cast, this play definitely has the potential for tediousness. Instead, it’s a master class of high drama, stylised melodrama even. With all the deaths that happen in the play, actors need to be able to die well enough not to incur giggles from the audience. This audience was consistently mesmerised, but I did get a bit weary of all the onstage deaths – by varied means, but the body count I think numbers just shy of double digits and happen in fairly quick succession after the Duchess dies twice in the first scene of Act 4. I ought to also mention that Act 3, Scene 2 is positively creepy as Ferdinand is in the Duchess’s bed and I got confirmation of my suspicions that Ferdinand’s interest in his sister’s affairs was altogether of the incestuous variety. It was all very well done, executed finely, but, while it had all the precision, it lacked heart. I felt sympathy and empathy for some of the characters, dislike for others, but after such an emotional roller coaster, one would think the audience ought to leave emotionally drained. Instead I was mildly irritated by what I call the “bothery bits”: the niggling things that just linger in one’s mind and taint the overall experience.  

Bothery bits:

• It may be a custom of the time it was written in, but the play’s final speech as delivered by Delio was reminiscent of how Hamlet ended with Horatio summing up the tragedy of the events.
• Delio – played by Tunji Kasim, had a wandering accent. Began as a North American one, became more English as the play progressed, and then slipped back and forth. Tsk, tsk. They give lessons for that, very close to the theatre too, I remember seeing a sign between Waterloo station and the theatre.
• During Bosola’s death scene (not Bonnar's fault), not shutting up and dying whilst supposedly dying reminded me of Antony’s death scene in Shakespeare’s Antony and Cleopatra. Again, maybe it was just what was done at the time, but it goes on and on (in Antony’s case, doesn’t he climb to a balcony so he can die in Cleopatra’s arms or was that just the most recent version I saw to give him something to do while he was dying but not getting on with it?). 

The Duchess of Malfi is at London's The Old Vic Theatre until June 9/12: Follow this link for more information and to purchase tickets: http://www.oldvictheatre.com/the-duchess-of-malfi/

* I'd seen Jamie Lloyd's production of She Stoops to Conquer (by Oliver Goldsmith) for the National Theatre earlier this year via NTlive and really enjoyed it. Very camp, and very good. 

The Recruiting Officer - Donmar Warehouse - April 7 and 10

I don’t often say this – I don’t think I’ve ever said this – I recently saw a play that was pure theatrical magic. I saw John Farquhar’s The Recruiting Officer at London’s Donmar Warehouse on the evening of Saturday, April 7 and on an impulse, again on Tuesday, April 10. Something I’d never done before: my phone call to the box office went something like this “It’s my last night in London, I saw the play on Saturday, do you have ANY tickets available for this evening?” – I ended up with a standing ticket. Fan-tas-tic!

Let’s begin with the venue: Donmar Warehouse. I had never been to the Donmar before and the space alone is wonderful. Only a few rows in Stalls and a few rows in Dress Circle – a maximum capacity of 250, it couldn't get more intimate, and yet it does: in order to access the first several rows in the stalls, the audience must step either on the stage itself or on the boards going from each front corner of the stage diagonally to the back of the house. I was supposed to have one of those front row seats, but was sent a front row Circle ticket instead, but that’s another story. The seats are padded wooden benches, the balustrade is also wood – it couldn’t look any more rustic if it tried. Shielded lights line the stage on the three audience-facing sides as well as the circle but the mood lighting comes mainly from 4 giant round chandeliers with at least 30 candles on each, lowered while the musicians played pre-show folksy music reminiscent of Cape Breton fiddling tunes a la Sandy McIntyre (location specific reference to many a Sunday afternoon spent in a Toronto pub on Yonge Street called the Bow & Arrow listening to wonderful folk music), and lit by members of the cast before being raised again – and providing a gorgeous sort of heat I was very grateful for. I think it was the first time I’d been warm in an indoor environment since I arrived in London 2 days prior.

The Recruiting Officer is technically not Restoration Theatre, the 18^th century resurgence in writing for theatre as well as production after the Puritan, no-nonsense rule of Oliver Cromwell. Restoration technically ended with the death of Queen Mary in 1698, this play was written in 1706 but retains the “comedy of manners” flavour, with sobering undertones. What I did not realise at the time was that John Farquhar actually was a recruiting officer in the early 1700s before becoming a playwright. Thank you for that information and more, my 3 pound programme. The tactics used in the play are historically accurate, even if the characters themselves: Captains Plume and Brazen, Mssrs Worthy, Balance, and Scales, for instance, are not.

I have to say I felt a little bad for Tobias Menzies (Captain Plume). He seemed to have to work at least twice as hard to get a fraction of the laughs that Mark Gatiss (Captain Brazen) got. Gatiss played his captain rather camp and it was delightful. Menzies played his captain fairly straight, which let his many words delivered in a raspy/husky voice speak to their best advantage, and it also made sense because the two male characters he had the most to do with, Sgt Kite and Mister Worthy, were melodramatic in their own ways. Worthy as a love-struck and underappreciated suitor of Melinda, and Sgt Kite as a resourceful and cunning recruiting officer who is at his most over-the-top as the German-gypsy fortune teller Conundrum. Someone has to be the grounding influence and that was Plume. His intellectual and emotional counterpart (and functional, as far as the dynamics of the play are concerned), was Silvia, which brings me to the women.   

Without exception, they are a laugh riot in their own right: Rachael Stirling as the newly-rich and newly-proud Melinda, her smart and ambitious maid Lucy played by Kathryn Drysdale, and Melinda’s cousin Silvia (played by Nancy Carroll), who is in love with Captain Plume but in a Twelfth Night sort of deception, dresses up in her deceased brother’s clothing so she can join her intended’s ranks after she learns she has become her father’s sole heir, and therefore out of Plume’s social class. Even a Captain of the Grenadiers has limits as to how high into society he can marry. A Justice’s daughter – no problem; a Justice’s heir to 1200 a year –major obstacle. Aimee-Ffion Edwards plays the country women, mainly Rose, a potential conquest of Plume’s, but also a pregnant young girl called to court when her baby’s father is ‘listed’ to the army. She also sings one (or was it two?) songs and had a very pleasant, young-sounding voice, underscoring the youth of the characters she plays. The airs, the vocal and inflective range, the dialogue – it was such fun. The humour amongst the women is chiefly about men and manners. The humour around the men was mainly around wenching and methods of recruiting. We’re not so different now, I think.

Unlike the musicians in the National Theatre’s production of The Comedy of Errors that I recently saw, the musicians in this play set the mood between scenes and each were proper members of the Company (speaking parts at least one each, some more) in their own right. At the NT, I’m sure the musicians were “filler” during set changes – familiar songs in a foreign language with rhythms and instrumentation that were a bit gypsy-like, I suppose. This play had no set to speak of: a sky-blue backdrop painted with white fluffy clouds in front of which rows of votive candles cascaded down, a virtual waterfall of candlelight. The musicians were fine instrumentalists as well as singers: Flute, fiddle, double-bass, guitar, drum/bodhran/tambourine. During one five-part harmony a capella piece, the flautist sang the top tenor part so incredibly beautifully. They and the music they played, were core components of the play, and the recurrence of the song “Over the Hills and far away” did much to influence mood and pathos.  

I did not understand the significance of the court scene – even after seeing it twice. MAYBE it has to do with the Justice’s verdict to Plume never to discharge Wilful from his army. Silvia, as Jack Wilful, her male alter-ego, had been arrested because of something to do with Rose. Then before we get to her/his part of the hearing, we meet two conscripts – the first is a father of five who is the sole provider for his wife and family and the second is a collier. According to the Acts of Parliament, they should never have been ‘listed because the first was the sole breadwinner and the other because he had a trade/profession. It does not take long to understand (I hope) that the Acts had been passed to protect people exactly like that, but even in a court of law, the ways in which those same Acts were interpreted rendered them virtually useless. I understand that part. Morally, these are the most important cases of the court session. Then we get to Silvia, the spurious charge against her, in a guise so complete her own father presiding over the court does not recognise her. Does there need to be a court case surrounding this upper class woman in man’s garb in order for there to BE a court case? In other words, was society so structured that the moral centre of the scene had to be disguised as a lead-in to the “main event” – a person of the upper classes becomes the focus and retains it until her true identity is revealed? Since 400 years later there is still discussion on the endurance of England’s class system, my feeling is that I have already answered my queries, and the answers are in the affirmative. But also see my first point regarding the verdict.  

The theatre, the play, this production: it was a truly magical night. Perfection. Twice. I cannot sufficiently express how special this production is. It is enjoyable, heart warming, hopeful, and sobering. There are truisms in spades that are as representative of the 21st century as they were in the 18th. The refreshing earnestness, the sublime pretensions, any plotting is done without any 'real' malice, set against the ever-present tension of what actually would await those poor 'listed men. Sometimes sub-text, sometimes metaphorical, and sometimes just blunt. This is what theatre should be. Rarely have I felt as privileged as I did to have seen this cast and production as often as I did. I would have gone nightly if it had been possible. 

The final performance of this production of The Recruiting Officer was on Saturday, April 14, 2012. For images and further links, visit http://www.donmarwarehouse.com/pl142.html

All New People - Duke of York's - April 7

I saw the matinee performance of All New People at London's Duke of York’s Theatre on Saturday, April 7. It struck me how thoroughly in the “modernist” movement this play is. As is so often the case, there is no resolution; more like a “slice of life” of 4 people who happen to meet at a location (in this case a beach house on Long Beach Island in the middle of winter) and things unfold from there. The four characters are strangers virtually – only 2 of them had ever met previously (Emma and Myron), but each had never met Charlie or Kim. Emma, as played by Eve Myles, is a bit of a basket case. She is in the US from Britain without a green card and is desperate to stay, but not desperate enough to marry Myron, played by Paul Hilton. Myron is in love with Emma, is the island’s fire chief and drug dealer, but he looks as though he might be one of his own best customers.

Where the play begins is with Charlie, played by Zach Braff, trying to hang himself on what turns out to be his 35^th birthday. How serious he is about the attempted suicide is debatable as he doesn’t slip kick the chair out from under him until he hears Emma’s approach. Either hearing her voice makes him think "do it now" and maybe he’ll be gone by the time she walks in, or hearing her voice means he’ll likely be rescued. The latter is obviously what happens and this starts the play off. Myron is called to the scene to assist Emma with Charlie and before too much time has passed, high-priced escort Kim (played by Susannah Fielding) arrives because Charlie’s friend Kevin hired her to keep Charlie company during his stay at Kevin’s beach house, not aware of Charlie’s ulterior motive in asking to use the house.

How the four got to where they were: Emma in New Jersey, Myron a fire chief on Long Beach Island, Kim hired to go to New Jersey, and Charlie at the point of suicide is told in filmed flashbacks, ably assisted by David Bradley, Amanda Redman, and Joseph Millson – they do not appear on stage, they only serve to provide a back story with the actors freezing as a screen is quickly and quietly lowered to play the relevant character’s defining moment and then being raised again, and then the story continues. Four characters, four defining moments - only Charlie’s moment is narrated by him in front of the screen in contrast to the other three which were more like a freeze-frame insertion. This ‘getting to know the characters’ is juxtaposed against the absurd idea that in order to keep Charlie from going through with his suicide, they cannot leave and so they decide to throw him an impromptu birthday party. Charlie, Emma, and Myron are all very tightly wound characters; it is Kim, who as the stereotypical dumb blonde provides a lot of the comedy relief, while the vast majority of the humour is a release from the tension of dramatic moments.

I don’t understand why this play is billed as a comedy. Yes, Zach Braff wrote/co-wrote it and he is most well known for playing comedic parts, but it is as much a comedy as Garden State was; most certainly a drama with funny parts, just like a comedy isn’t just one laugh after another for 2 hours and then you go home. The play ends with Kim singing a song she wrote while Myron is smoking on the balcony, and Charlie and Emma are holding each other in what I can only interpret as desperation. By that time Emma has kind of-sort of asked Charlie out but he doesn’t react to Emma’s proposition, so while Charlie’s motivation to sit by a crying Emma to comfort her is credible in its awkwardness, his guiding her head towards the front of his shoulder for what ends up being a long, caressing embrace as Kim sings her sad song, the lyrics of which sum up the play fairly well, is not. I do wonder where that came from because this is a character who two short hours ago was slipping a noose around his neck and ends up with a very emotional new (maybe) girlfriend? He had shown her no interest up to that point. Even when he was shouting at her to get her to leave, it was because he wanted to be left alone. The tightly wound characters had each revealed themselves to be deeply unhappy people, and Kim is the eternal optimist who keeps on making lemonade, sharing with the others the wisdom that if you don’t like the world as it is, be consoled in the fact that in a hundred years’ time, there’ll be all new people. Simple as her logic is, she doesn’t see that in order for there to be “All New People”, all of the people currently living can be no more. Ah, there’s the rub...or is that the irony? 

Closing Night on April 28, 2012. Tickets (if available) via Ambassador Ticket Group http://www.atgtickets.com/
Poster Image from hamlife.blogspot.com

As a side note: it was less than 10 degrees Celsius outside at the time. Just because the play’s action took place in the middle of winter didn’t mean the air-conditioning needed to be on. The audience only needs to suspend their disbelief, they do not need to bodily commiserate. The actors (with the exception of Kim) were wearing sufficient amounts of clothing with bright lights shining on them – we members of the audience were not as lucky. I never took my coat or gloves off. 

Being Human (the original) – Season 3 to Season 4 transition

Disclaimer: for people who haven’t watched any Series 4, this review contains some spoilers. This review only affects the first half of the series. 

Watching the first half of Series 4 made me realise how utterly DARK Series 3 was. As it turns out, it was the swan song for ¾ of the regular cast, with Aidan Turner’s character getting dusted* in the final episode of Series 3, Sinead Keenan not returning in Series 4 but her death is referenced a couple of times as having occurred a mere week after Eve was born, and Russell Tovey’s departure at the end of the first episode of Series 4. As despondent George, Tovey was very much secondary to Michael Socha’s Tom McNair becoming more of a presence in the development of a narrative dynamic. Over a very short period of time, young Tom has turned into the show’s “action man” ** while George seemed to be paralysed by grief and in one final act of heroism assists in the rescue of his daughter which costs him his life, which he has no issue with.

Series 4, Episode 1 Eve of the War offers a nice twist. Right up until the end of the first episode, viewers had been led to believe that the flash forwards to a young woman in the year 2037, in possession of the vampire prophecy involving Eve was in fact Eve, until the moment she declares her intent of killing the child back in 2012ish. Then doubt creeps in for the viewer. Is she or is she not?

    

Damien Molony offers a lot of depth to the position left vacant by Aidan Turner as resident frenemy vampire. As Hal, an “Old One”, he has even more of a past than Mitchell did, and he’s been “clean” a much shorter amount of time relative to his age (not yet revealed). Molony himself is a recent theatre graduate (2011) and a relative unknown, but he brings a lot of intensity, tension, and integrity to the part. I actually saw him in the National Theatre’s production of Travelling Light several months ago and as one of the two leading males, and in the dual roles of Nate and Motl, he definitely stood out as someone to watch.  

Another twist of a sort was the introduction of Lee Ingleby as the efficient and brutal über-vamp Edgar Wyndam taking control of a department of police near the end of the final episode of Series 3. Great, I thought. I’d like to see what kind of havoc he tries to wreak in the coming series. Not so. He is referenced in the past tense in the first episodes as having been killed, so there was a definite void in the vampire enemy category: enter Andrew Gower as Cutler, who looked very familiar and turns out I remembered him from his first commercial role as a surgical intern in the ITV series Monroe (starring the always amazing James Nesbitt, Sarah Parish and Tom Riley). Veering away from the stereotypical Being Human vampire profession of policeman, Cutler’s “day job” is that of a lawyer, which is revealed in the fourth episode A Spectre Calls as he advocates for Tom to be released from jail. This episode is my favourite of the first 4: it is seriously creepy (Kirby’s machinations), seriously tugs at the heart strings (Tom’s anticipation of his first birthday party), and seriously laugh-out-loud funny*** in the scene with the GP when Tom and Hal pretend to be lovers in order to present themselves as ‘plausible caregivers’ for Eve - Annie’s ghostiness very much a disadvantage when dealing with people from social services or, in this case, the medical profession.

So far it’s like a brand-new show. New faces. New feel. What is paramount is that the “supernatural trinity” of vampire/werewolf/ghost co-habitating stays intact, that much is clear. Apart from that, it’s probably not a good a idea to get attached. As evidenced in the transition between Series 3 and 4, everyone is disposable.    

* Buffy the Vampire Slayer reference.

** Michael Socha proving to be just as much a force to be reckoned with as his younger sister Lauren is on Misfits.

*** Mind you, in the episode “The Graveyard Shift”, there are also a number of really funny moments. Molony and Socha have very good comedic chemistry.