Risible poppycock
Lloyd Evans
Rattle of a Simple Man Comedy Suddenly Last Summer Albety The Lodger Pentameters
I've been to one-act plays that were one act too long, but Rattle of a Simple Man is five hours too long and it only lasts half that time. Risible poppycock would seem a generous label for this sorry piece of jetsam. It's hardly worth saying anything else, because by the time this review appears the show will have closed, the actors will be under sedation and the investors will have gone into hiding.
At the Albery, Suddenly Last Summer has the right credentials to draw in flocks of easily pleased theatre-goers. Big star, steamy script, famous author. What more do they want? Read the play in advance and you may have your doubts. It feels like a longish and faintly preposterous short story clumsily transplanted on to the stage. Arriving at the theatre, I was dismayed to see that the atmosphere-fanatics had been busy. The auditorium was shrouded in a strange humid fog, and I saw discreet pumps overhead squirting dry ice into the air to create that authentic subtropical feel. The set was hidden behind a huge and ominous steel pie full of holes pierced by silvery blades of light. Atmosphere, atmosphere. The more they try to convince you that you're not in a theatre, the more they remind you that you are. The lights went down, there was a thumping great howl from the speakers, and the big pie split to reveal what looked like the conservatory of a southern mansion shortly after being invaded by triffids. Dripping tree boles lined the walls and all across the grimy windows snaked thorny boughs of preCambrian undergrowth. From the soundtrack came the ghostly shrieks of swampbirds and mating dinosaurs.
Then out tottered Diana Rigg with sparkly eyes and an impressive crouch. She even had a small bolster strapped to her shoulder-blade to accentuate the curve of her spine. As the hateful old hag Violet Venable she gave a pretty good account of herself. Victoria Hamilton, playing her niece, Cousin Catherine, had a tougher challenge. Catherine arrives on day-release from the happy farm and, already close to
nervous collapse, she has to sustain our interest as she trembles and quavers her way through an investigation into the mysterious death of Cousin Sebastian.
The structure of the play puts a great strain on the audience. All the juicy bits have happened last year, so the narrative tugs you constantly into the past when you want the action to unfold right here, right now, in front of you. You have to piece together the story from the testimony of strident aunties and blubbing belles. The truth about Sebastian's death, when it emerges, is so melodramatic that it feels more like a masochistic fantasy than a real event. The director has decided to fill in the gaps by adding a colourful soundtrack. These noises seem like the work of an unimaginative lunatic on a sabotage mission. When Cousin Catherine describes Cousin Sebastian racing down a street, the whole theatre erupts with oompah oompah, fake heartbeats, oompah oompah, like that. When the creepy doctor prepares to inject Cousin Catherine with a sedative, we hear a flock of terrified toucans taking wing. This motif, the launch of the squawking vultures, is repeated endlessly. Each time a speech approaches a Significant Moment, we get an earful from the rainforest as an exultation of pterodactyls surges into the air. I found the whole production vacant, sluggish, improbable and frustrat ing. My companion absolutely loved it. i> A show that deserves success is The Lodger by Paul Birtill. The lead character is a disgruntled poet with no job, no girlfriend and a drink problem. His face is smothered in acne and he eats pigs' trotters for supper. His bedsit is visited by a grim coterie of villains, drug-addicts, cadgers and relatives. When he hires out his spare room to a blonde vegetarian, she promptly rejects his advances. Depressing? You bet. The setting and the characters are so gruesome that this script ought to have won a production at the Royal Court or the nearby Hampstead Theatre. But this wouldn't suit those venues because it's warm, moving and hilariously funny. Birtill has a touch of brilliance, even of genius, as a writer of dialogue. I don't exaggerate. If there's a more entertaining comedy on anywhere in the country at the moment, I'd be amazed. Pentameters is just around the corner from Hampstead Tube. The show runs there till June. If I were you, I'd run there too.
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