Temple at The Donmar

I’m not a great lover of political or religious plays and Temple concerns both.  Its saving grace for me is that it stars Simon Russell Beale, who, as is to be expected, is marvellous in the role of The Dean.

Temple, written by Steve Waters, is an imagining of what went on behind the scenes in St. Pauls during the Occupy London protests of 2011.  It highlights the emotional and constitutional crisis that went on within the solid walls of this iconic cathedral. 

The Dean, the Right Reverend Graeme Knowles is sympathetically portrayed by the great Mr. Beale.  At the time, he was severely criticised for closing the cathedral, albeit briefly, and also for taking the side of the London Corporation against the camp.  His actions caused the resignation of the “right on” Canon Chancellor, as played here by Paul Higgins. 

The play takes places on the morning of the 28^th October with the cathedral about to re-open.  Set in the Chapter House, the designer Tim Hatley captures the majesty of the building at the heart of the story by having it loom up behind the huge upstage windows. With tom toms beating away in the background, the scene is set to great effect.  Simon Russell Beale’s Dean is in crisis.  Anxious to re-open the church for worship, he is surrounded by problems on all sides.  His resigning Canon Chancellor is not going quietly, the female Verger (Anna Calder-Marshall) is concerned that the building isn’t ready, whilst Malcolm Sinclair’s lofty Bishop, although sympathetic, is hopeful of reaching some sort of agreement with the protestors.  Added to this, he has a new, young and not altogether finger on the pulse, personal assistant (Rebecca Humphries).  Also, and more importantly, he is under pressure from the City of London to evict the protestors.  Not a great start to the day.  Mr. Beale does a wonderful job, as not only does he show the isolation the Dean feels, but also determines that his initial unsympathetic character eventually elicits our sympathy.  We truly believe he is a man of the cloth, communing with his maker during his many active silences.

Steve Waters has written a thought provoking play which highlights aspects of the “occupation” of which I was unaware.  However I do find it hard to believe that the Dean would end up listening to the pearls of wisdom his new PA has to offer seeing as how she appears so dim witted at the start.  It is to Rebecca Humphries credit that she does just manage to change from gawky useless to authoritative voice. I could also have done without the contrivance of bringing on two choir boys towards the end, even though they did sing beautifully.

As usual, Howard Davies does a great job in directing a tightly controlled production with more than a hint of humour, especially when Malcolm Sinclair is centre stage.

American Buffalo at Wyndhams Theatre

For the uninitiated American Buffalo isn't a play about a genus of bovine but concerns a copper nickel five-cent piece.  At least this is the main premise but dig deeper and the play is about much more than that.  David Mamet insists that his characters never mean what they say but always mean what they mean.  So his 1975 play, whilst centering on a plot to steal the coin of the title, is actually about how men interact with one another and the certain codes of contact between them.  It also concerns business, money, friendship and betrayal and, with just three men in the cast, is a true ensemble piece that draws you into their relationship with one another.  The script is littered with expletives, a common occurrence in Mamet’s plays, but there is a beauty to the language.  The swearing is used when the correct adjective or adverb is unknown to the men.  This is not to say they’re totally uneducated, just not terribly literate and why anyone would be offended is beyond me.  It is the language of such men and after a while the words become part of the landscape and are forgotten.

The action takes place in Don Dubrow’s (John Goodman) junk shop. beautifully realised by the Set Designer Paul Wills.  There is no available space, as objects, ranging from old bicycles to various signs and dilapidated toys, hang and lean everywhere. 

Don has sold a rare coin, the American Buffalo of the title, to a customer for a mere $90 and is determined to do a bit of business by stealing it back and then re-selling it at a much higher price.  Having found out where the customer lives, he has instructed his “protégé”, Bob (Tom Sturridge), to keep a watchful eye on the potential crime scene in order to ascertain the best time to strike.  The problems arise with the arrival of Walter Cole/’Teach’ (Damian Lewis) who, on discovering the plan, wants to be part of the action instead of Bob.  The trouble is, they, plus the unseen Fletcher, are four of life’s losers and whatever they touch turns to dust.

The three actors are exemplary, although John Goodman appears the most at ease and comfortable in his role as Don.  Being American must surely help, for whilst the other two actors have mastered the US vernacular, their accents do occasionally sound forced.  Damien Lewis, almost unrecognizable in a crumpled rust coloured suit, matching shoes and droopy 70’s moustache, plays the showiest character and expertly manages to portray Teach’s neediness which he tries to hide with ego and bluster.  The young Tom Sturridge gives enough twitchy mannerisms and nervousness to show his vulnerability and dependence now on Don instead of drugs, whilst John Goodman is magnificent.  Don is not the brightest pebble on the beach and has trouble programming his thought process.  Thanks to Goodman’s expressive face we’re always aware of this and his eventual realization that he is betraying Bob. His guilt is as palpable as his compassion at the end of the play. 

These men are life’s losers but they do have feeling.  The ending is unbelievably poignant and even the self-centered and self-pitying Teach portrays a certain degree of self-awareness.

With tight direction from Daniel Evans and star billing all round, this production has no disappointments.

Clarence Darrow at The Old Vic

I missed Kevin Spacey’s performance in Clarence Darrow last year, so was thrilled to discover it was returning for a limited run.  And, goodness me, am I glad I had the chance to witness the great man’s swansong as Artistic Director at The Old Vic.  It is a tour de force that marks him as one of the greats.  He commands the stage and holds the whole audience in the palm of his hand.  No small feat when you alone are playing to the crowd in the theatre’s reconfigured in-the-round space.  It would be so easy for part of the audience to feel disengaged, but Mr. Spacey doesn’t allow this to happen.  He prowls the stage he has owned during his eleven year tenure, stalks amongst the audience and, on the odd occasion even sits down with them.  He has the knack of making you feel he is talking just to you and revels in his role as Civil Rights Lawyer, Clarence Darrow.  He obviously finds this famous American fascinating, having already played him twice before.  Once in a TV film and then in the play Inherit The Wind, directed at The Old Vic by Trevor Nunn and which focuses on the Scopes “Monkey Trial”.

It’s difficult to find Spacey on stage once the lights go up.  Where is the great man?  Eventually he can be found lying underneath his desk fixing something or other.  Nothing is said for quite a while.  A ploy, but a clever one nevertheless, as we’re all hooked, spellbound even.  Before he utters a word, Spacey scans the theatre, taking in his audience.  Such is his skill, we all feel we’ve been noticed, and when he eventually speaks you can hear a pin drop.

The set, designed by Alan Macdonald, depicts Darrow’s office.  It is cluttered with boxes and Spacey spends much of the play delving into them, retrieving photos and memorabilia that remind him of his past life and work.  We’re then privy to these reminiscences, at times believing ourselves to be jurors at his various trials.  So impassioned is he that we believe it’s the crumpled and stooped lawyer himself we’re watching, so much at the pinnacle of his craft that we can almost see the ex-wife, or various defendants to whom he speaks.  With every conspiratorial glance, twinkling eye, cheeky smile and shaken fist Kevin Spacey has us in his thrall.

Darrow himself championed the under dog and defended the little guy, the common folk.  During his tenure as a lawyer, he saved more than 100 lives from hanging, often in the most difficult of circumstances.  He was totally against prejudice of any kind, so often found himself representing African Americans.  He even defended himself on a couple of occasions after having been wrongly indicted on two counts of jury bribery.  So it’s no wonder that David W. Rintels wrote this play in 1974 or that Spacey has been so keen to appear in it.  In fact he first came across it in 1974 when he was in High School and saw Henry Fonda as Clarence Darrow.  In the foreward of the programme, Spacey says that Darrow is a character he has come to know and I suspect admire, mentioning, as he does, his dignity, intelligence and logic.  And wow, does this show during the 1hr 50minutes of his superb performance, brilliantly directed by Thea Sharrock.

Kevin Spacey will be sorely missed at The Old Vic.  Thanks to his wonderful performance in Moon For The Misbegotten, I became a fully paid up member of this great theatre.  My only hope is that this isn’t the last time we’ve seen him on a London stage.

Rules For Living at The Dorfman

We all develop ways of coping with the stresses and strains of modern life but most of us don’t adhere to them as fanatically as the family depicted in Rules for Living, a new play by Sam Holcroft, currently playing in rep at The Dorfman.

An article at the front of the programme describes the whys and wherefores of CBT (Cognitive-Behavioural Therapy), which, I’m guessing, was the starting point for this cleverly devised comedy.  The goal of CBT is to make “patients” recognise their various emotional traps and ultimately help them discontinue the coping strategies (Rules for Living) they have devised.  In a nutshell it ultimately makes them feel better and more confident.

The problem is that the family gathered for Christmas in Rules For Living seem unaware that they are in need of a dose of CBT.  Indeed the therapy is only mentioned as a possible course of action to combat the negative attitude of Emma, the teenager who spends most of the play off stage.

As Alan Ayckbourn brilliantly portrayed in Seasons Greetings, Christmas is often the catalyst for family tensions and so it is with this play. Edith, the mother, who is hosting Christmas lunch, plans everything with a military precision, is desperate for everything to run like clockwork and for everyone to have the best time ever.  The trouble is that her two sons, Matthew and Adam, have unresolved issues with one another, Adam and his wife, Sheena are in the throes of splitting up and Matthew’s girlfriend, Carrie feels inadequate and, as a consequence, is embarrassingly loud.  Add to this the fact that her domineering husband, Francis, has a few hours respite from hospital and her nerves are as highly strung as a Stradivarius.

How does she cope?  Well, displayed on a games board above the stage is “Edith must clean to keep calm”.  And she’s not the only one.  The other members of the family have similar strategies relayed for all to see.  Matthew “must sit to tell a lie”, Carrie “must stand to tell a joke” and so on and so forth.  As a result we’re totally aware of what is to come and thus the humour is intensified, especially when later on their rituals become even more involved.  We soon realise the problems each character faces and the descent into chaos for each is inevitable, especially when we are forewarned with the playing of a board game entitled Bedlam.

Marianne Elliott’s direction is spot on, whilst Chloe Lamford’s open plan kitchen, complete with Aga, is a joy.  The performances, too, are exemplary.  The excellent Stephen Mangan as Adam, the failed would-be cricketer, is brilliant at hiding his self loathing behind a quick, sardonic wit.  His wife, Sheena, played by Claudie Blakley, excellently portrays her disappointment with life in general and succour in the odd drink or four in particular.  Miles Jupp’s Matthew turns insincerity into an art form, whilst Deborah Findlay’s Edna, is a mother we all recognise.  My daughter certainly did when Adam was handed a coaster for his mug so that a mark wasn’t left on the table;  I received a hefty dig in the ribs as acknowledgement!

Rules for Living will have its detractors, but I’m not one of them.

Closer at The Donmar

The Donmar Warehouse is one of London’s little gems and paying my yearly membership is money well spent.   I’m usually lucky enough to secure a downstairs seat, but not for their latest production, unfortunately.  The size of the Donmar means that there are really no bad seats, but an intimate play such as Closer is so much better viewed at “closer” quarters. There is no question that Patrick Marber’s play deserved the accolades it received back in 1997 and this first revival at the Donmar is, I am sure just as good.  It is a great play, which really does capture the havoc that sex and infidelity can produce and the four actors involved deliver good performances. So why wasn’t I totally convinced?   Probably because sitting side on, upstairs, means little nuances and facial expressions are lost and total involvement is somewhat impaired.

Closer is the story of two men, Dan and Larry and two women, Alice and Anna.  Their lives intertwine, the common denominator being sex.  Dan, an obituarist meets Alice after she’s been run over by a taxi.  He takes her to hospital where she is examined by dermatologist Larry.  Dan and Alice become an item.  Following the publication of his first book based on Anna’s experiences he meets Alice, a photographer.  He is immediately smitten and his persistence eventually pays off.  Another conquest.  In the meantime, Larry, via an internet chat room, has been lured to meet Alice, having been wrongly under the impression that she’s keen to indulge in whatever sexual ideas he can come up with.  I say wrongly, because he’s actually chatting to Dan!  So, Larry and Anna meet and eventually marry.  And so it goes on.  Ring-a-ring-a-couples.

The content is explicit and “in your face”.  The sexual dialogue that takes place over the internet is shown on a large screen and Act Two opens in a strip club.  Neither is supposedly as shocking nowadays as it would have been when the play was first performed, but a handful of the audience obviously thought so, as they didn’t return after the interval.  But then Patrick Marber obviously expects a strong reaction.  He pulls no punches in showing the two men’s preoccupation with sex and feels no compulsion to portray them in a good light.  It’s a very honest insight into certain men’s phsyche and the pursuit of sex and love by both sexes.  Closer is as much a play about lying (or at least concealing the truth) as anything else.  Alice’s whole existence is based on fiction, Dan pretends to be Anna and Larry hides the fact that he isn’t averse to using the internet to pick up a woman for casual sex.  And when they’re not lying, their unburdening of the truth to their prospective partners wounds, even fatally in one instance.

This may sound too depressing for words, but David Leveaux gives Patrick Marber’s play a lightness of touch that highlights the playwright’s great way with words.  It is a very original piece with some great dialogue and laugh out loud moments and Bunny Christie’s neutral set reconfigures well into whatever location is needed.

The four actors deliver assured performances, if not always producing the fizzling sexual chemistry in their relationships with one another.  Rufus Sewell  is the handsome Larry, at times cruelly calculating, at others seemingly insecure.  Rachel Redford imbues Alice with the right amount of needy vulnerabilityy on the one hand and a superficial steely confidence on the other, whilst Nancy Carroll is predictably good as the manipulative and sensual Anna.  The least convincing is the usually excellent Oliver Chris, who fails to produce much sex appeal.

Closer, located in an area north of St Pauls where Patrick Marber lives, is a play I wish I’d seen first time round, or at least seen it in my normal downstairs seat.

A View From The Bridge At Wyndhams Theatre

Second time around and this superlative production still manges to enthral.  The venue is different but the quality remains, although The Young Vic staging was slightly more effective than the proscenium stage here at The Wyndhams Theatre.  I only say this because sitting in Row B, the faces of the actors, whilst seated, are sometimes obscured by the three sided glass “boxing ring”.  Plus, the director, Ivo Van Hove has decided not to break the tension of this taut, powerful production by having an interval.  An inconsiderate decision by two front row audience members to pay the loo a visit half way through nearly undermined this. The Young Vic audience on the other hand were much more involved.  One could hear a pin drop during the entire two hours.

The review I did in June last year still stands and is re-produced below.

Praise has already been heaped upon Belgian director Ivo Van Hove’s production of Arthur Miller’s A View From The Bridge at The Young Vic and luckily I managed to get to see it before the run ended last night.  I can’t think of enough superlatives to describe how good a production this is and as practically the whole theatre stood to applaud at the end, they obviously agree with me.

In a three sided, see through empty box, akin to a boxing ring, the barefooted actors pad around and encircle one another often with Faure’s Requiem playing in the background.  There are practical reasons for Jan Versweyveld’s bare staging, all of which are revealed at the end of the mesmerising two hours, when the cast, enveloped in a rugger type scrum get rained upon by a torrent of red “blood”.  Such is the racked-up tension by director Ivo Van Hove that we all know (even those not familiar with Miller’s take on a Greek tragedy) that the denouement won’t be pretty.  And such is the brilliance of the whole cast, that we are caught up, carried along and left exhausted, emotionally spent and elated when the die is cast.

A View From The Bridge centres around Eddie Carbone, inhabited here by the magnificent Mark Strong, who works as a longshoreman in 1950’s Brooklyn.  He and his wife, Beatrice, the equally brilliant Nicola Walker, have brought up her orphaned niece, Catherine since childhood.  Now seventeen, Catherine is ready to spread her wings, but Eddie is not so keen.  Still treating her like the child she often appears to be, we realise that his is a suffocating, all consuming, unhealthy love.  A love which bothers his long suffering wife, Bea and also eventually threatens to alienate the doting niece.  Eddie’s jealousy knows no bounds when Bea’s two Sicilian cousins arrive to stay with them, unleashing a series of events that have terrible consequences.  For Catherine falls in the love with Rodolpho, the younger brother, the love is reciprocated and Eddie is unable to come to terms with it.  Add the fact that the cousins have entered the States illegally and you have a tinder box situation where betrayal, seething resentment and ultimately violence is the outcome.  We, the audience watch appalled as the tragedy unfolds, as does the lawyer who is narrating the story.

There are outstanding performances from the whole cast.  Mark Strong captures the pain and emotional breakdown of Eddie with such raw emotion that we feel for him whilst at the same time despairing of his actions.    Nicola Walker’s despair at what her husband is doing to the family is heartbreaking to watch, whilst Phoebe Fox manages to portray Catherine’s childishness whilst at the same time highlighting her metamorphosis into a young woman.  Michael Gould as Alfieri the anguished lawyer helps to build the tension and there is also excellent work from Luke Norris as Rudolpho and Emun Elliot as his brother Marco.  Marco’s lifting of the chair in order to show his muscular superiority over Eddie is so threatening that the spine tingles. 

Ivo van Hove has surely produced a superlative piece of theatre and I left the Young Vic feeling I had witnessed something very special indeed.

Man and Superman at The Lyttleton

There are two overriding factors regarding this revival of Bernard Shaw’s Man and Superman; it is extremely long and Ralph Fiennes is a brilliant John Tanner.  Written in 1903, this play is rarely revived, which is not surprising seeing its running time of three hours, forty minutes (the uncut version a whopping five hours) and the fact that there is very little action by the characters who all talk too much.  It is a preachy tome, which ultimately highlights Shaw’s disinterest in romance and obsession with putting forward his own philosophical views.  Only an actor of the calibre of Mr. Fiennes could begin to make this play not only watchable, but extremely funny.  And my oh my how difficult the script must have been to learn, for John Tanner spews forth endless swathes of repetitive dialogue. 

In a nutshell, the main plot of the story is that a wily woman gets her man in the end, despite him being a commitment phobe and totally opposed to the idea of being in love.  Tanner, the object of her affection, spends the play highlighting the reasons for this objection in the form of contradictory speeches.  Boring?  Mostly no, for Ralph Fiennes injects the part with so much light and shade and humour that really the only somewhat tedious bit is that which is often omitted from productions of this play.  This being the act that sees Fiennes’s Tanner turning into Don Juan and arguing with the Devil in Hell about willpower and idealism.  Strange?  Very.

The woman in question is Ann Whitefield (Indira Varma) who, on the death of her father, inherits two guardians.  One is the wealthy Tanner, author of The Revolutionist’s Handbook, whilst the other is Roebuck Ramsden (Nicholas Le Provost).  Ramsden, is a conservative, boring old hypocrite, totally disapproving of Tanner and his ideals.  On realising that his ward is out to “nab” him, Tanner and his chauffeur (Elliot Barnes-Worrell) escape to Spain, where they are captured by bandits, the leader of whom is the lovelorn Mendoza (Tim McMullan).  Needless to say, Ann catches up with them in Granada in the final act.

The Director, Simon Godwin, has set the play in modern day and his opening really makes one sit up and take notice, for the first words we hear spoken are by Kirsty Young.  She is introducing her castaway, the “provocateur protagonist and author of a handbook designed to “set a new direction” for society.  The strains of Mozart’s Don Giovanni then burst forth, this being Jack Tanner’s first choice on his Desert Island Discs.  The brilliant Designer Christopher Oram lives up to his high standard with an evocative set and there is excellent work from the large cast.

Particular mention must go to Indira Varma, who not only brings a strength of character to the role of Ana, but also a sexual frisson, so no-one is at all surprised when Mr. Tanner finally capitulates.  Tim McMullan is also excellent playing an exceptionally funny brigand and debonair Devil.  What a captivating voice this actor has.

This production may be a tad too long and yet another one I didn’t always totally understand (some of the speeches went totally over my head), but it is really worth seeing, not just for the perfomances mentioned, but to see Mr. Fiennes manoeuvre a superb white Jaguar soft top off the huge Lyttleton stage.  On the night I saw it, he very nearly took out part of Christopher Oram’s set.  Now that would have been interesting!