First off was 'Pygmalion' at The Garrick Theatre with Rupert Everett as the bonkers phonetics 'professor', 'Enery 'Iggins. I've never seen or read the play but I'm familiar with the story (and not just from 'My Fair Lady') and what an excellent tale it is. Shaw's Edwardian tale of class, education and gender politics is an enormously fun romp through every stereotype imaginable and ends with a delicious ambiguity - do they or don't they?
The fast pace of the production keeps it moving forward with no fat or filler and the cast play it to a T. I must admit, I think of Rupert Everett as a film star rather than as an actor but seeing him on stage changed my opinion - he was excellent and this role could've been written for him. Alistair McGowan has now taken over the part but I'm pleased I saw Mr Everett. The other actor who impressed me was Roberta Taylor as Mrs Pearce, the housekeeper and voice of reason. I vaguely remember Roberta from 'Eastenders' years ago and she was a steadying presence on the stage with Prof Higgins ranting on and being self-centred. Kara Tointon was a very pretty Eliza Doolittle - her East End accent seemed to wander all over the place (and was almost unintelligible in places) but she was great speaking posh with the odd bit of slang thrown in for good measure.
However, I must retain most praise for Diana Rigg as the good professor's mother. Diana will always be Mrs Emma Peel from 'The Avengers' to me and I just *know* she was wearing a black leather cat-suit and high heels under her period costume. She was great as the mother who's had to endure her son embarrassing her for far too long and now treats him almost as a joke and Diana and Rupert made it look so real and engaging... then again, he's of an age to remember Mrs Peel so maybe he was scared of being kicked into submission?
Anyway, I thoroughly enjoyed the production and am delighted to have seen Rupert and Diana on the same stage. Take my advice and go and see it.
The second play with accents was 'Anna Christie' by Eugene O'Neill at The Donmar Warehouse. The cast is English but we get Swedish, American and Irish accents thrown together. Now, I've never heard of this play or seen the film so had no idea what to expect (I like to be surprised). It's a powerful, but a shouty, play. I'm not keen on shouty plays.
Its central character is Anna, a young woman from the American plains who travels to New York to see the father she's never really known since he was away at sea when she was young and her mother moved from Sweden to cousins in Minesotta when she was five, at which point her mother died. She slaves on the farm and is raped by one of her cousins before running away to live (and work) in a brothel. After a spell in prison she travels east to find her father who now runs a coal barge between New York and Boston and it's here that the play starts. Anna joins her father on his next voyage and they rescue a shipwrecked crew during a storm and she falls for an brash Irish stoker with plenty of good words for himself. Clearly, there's a lot more going on in the play but that clues you in.
And that's what leaves me puzzled about the plotting of this play. Anna has had a harrowing life so far, raped by cousins and living in a brothel for two years with, I assume, abuse right, left and centre, yet she falls for an aggressive and violent man. How does that happen? At point she shouts at her father and suitor to stop trying to tell her what to do because she'll do what she decides, not what some man tells her what to do. She's clearly been there before but this time she seems to willingly go for the potentially abusive man who threatens her and screams in her face. Is this meant to be a 'love conquers all' thing? I somehow doubt it, particularly the ambiguous ending. It has some powerful messages for its original American audience, with tales of immigration and hardship, of violence and poverty building the nation.
The shouty Irish navvy is played by Jude Law (who's clearly been hitting the gym to bulk up for the part). He's got a great Irish brogue going on but, at least in his first scene, it was a bit too thick for me to follow. I loved it when he strayed into a West Indies accent every now and then - he must know he's doing it, he must hear it himself, and it made me grin. Ruth Wilson's accent was pure Brooklyn and David Hayman has a great (if terribly stereotypical) Swedish accent as Anna's father, cursing that Old Devil Sea. I also liked Jenny Galloway as the old sailors' woman friend who's ejected when his daughter appears, a nicely played role.
No comments:
Post a Comment