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Gethsemane
By Sir David Hare
Faber and Faber £9 99
123 pages
Dateline: 23rd November, 2008
Frequently, when one reads the script of a new play soon after seeing
it produced on stage, there seems to be a case of the Emperor's new
clothes. Without all of the stage business and dramatic action, a text
that had seemed exciting and vibrant turns out to have far less depth
and merit than had originally appeared to be the case.
However, with a work like Gethsemane, Sir David Hare's new state
of the nation offering currently showing at the National, the script
is a real boon, not to mention a pleasure.
The play focuses primarily on a British Home Secretary today. It shows
this lady facing the greatest stress levels imaginable, as both her
husband and daughter come under the media microscope for their foibles.
Adding colour and vibrancy to the portrait are a long-haired, rich political
fixer, a schoolteacher turned busker and the oiliest of prime ministers.
While Howard Davies' production in the Cottesloe Theatre was of the
highest quality, characterised by a strong cast and great pace, reading
the text adds to the experience.
Where a playwright wishes to put across as much information as is the
case here, it is inevitable that amidst the dramas on stage, imperfectly
enunciated lines and those inevitable lapses in concentration that occur
for no very good reason, a mobile phone going off, a sneeze, or merely
a loose thought, some of the lines may not be fully appreciated.
A brief example shows Sir David's ability to capture the moment. Meredith
Guest, the Home Secretary both compels and repels as she says in suitably
Thatcherite tones "That's why, these days, it's so interesting
being a politician. Sorry, but you have to trust us. You have no choice".
She gets many of the best lines and sheds light not only on political
life today but also the more mundane lives that the less august experience.
"We all work harder and harder and to less and less effect. Everyone
does. Everything that once was easy has now become difficult".
Don't we know it?
It is also a real joy to take in at a slightly more relaxed pace the
dialogue at a meeting between Meredith and her Prime Minister, Alec
Beasley, when her future and that of her family are discussed. The posturing
and jockeying for position seem entirely in keeping with the nature
of political life today. That is the strength of this work - the way
in which the public and the personal interact, despite the best efforts
of all concerned to keep them apart.
In doing this, Sir David skewers not only the shallow politicians that
we have all come to accept (and even vote for) but also the media, who
bring them to office lavishing praise before shooting the poor devils
down with all of the sympathy of a hired Mafia hitman.
Gethsemane is a fine successor to a series of political plays
that this writer has produced over decades. It perfectly catches the
mood of a country that has finally "seen through" a Prime
Minister who remained in office a little too long and satirises the
opportunism and cynicism that permeate every political party today.
Do not miss the stage version,
if you can get a ticket. However, whether you see it or not, the text
is well worth a read.
Philip Fisher
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