|
|
|
|
The
Edinburgh Fringe
|
|
|
|
Fringe 2004 Reviews (10)Gone Glyn Cannon's take on Sophocles' Antigone gives the play a modern setting with a chorus of three advisers, perfect representatives of that modern political phenomenon, the spin-doctor. The body of Polyneices is not left to rot but is left in a drawer in a mortuary, from which is it stolen. It is not a guard who brings the news to Creon, but a mortuary attendant. Anotigone doesn't bury the body but keeps it in a box in her room, something which we only discover towards the end of the play but which has been telegraphed somewhat by frequent references by everyone else to the foul smell in the room. But back to the spin doctors. The play begins with video footage - "live from the Palace" - in which Creon, in best political "you can trust me" mode, explains to the nation his reasons for giving Eteocles a state funeral but denying burial to Polyneices, a mode which he even adopts within the family, when talking to Haemon. No one could fault the performances, with Nigel Hastings as Creon and Julie Hickman (Antigone) being particularly strong. I do, however, have reservations about the play. Whilst the Antigone story is a good vehicle for comment on political spin, I cannot see why only the minor characters (Ismene, Haemon, the mortuary guy, and the rather weak Eurydice) are sympathetic. Antigone is too abrasive to hold our sympathy for long and the idea of her keeping the body in her room (and watching her caressing it in a scne with more than slight overtones of necrophilia) repels us. There is a similar - but opposite - ambiguity in Anouilh's 1940s version of the story, but there the ambiguity arises out of the fact that both Antigone and Creon are sympathetic characters and right according to their own lights. Finally Anouilh comes down - inevitably, give the circumstances of the Nazi occupation of Paris during which it was written - on the side of Antigone and the conscience of the individual. Cannon, on the other hand, leaves us in the air, unable really to relate to either side. Peter Lathan Playing It Cool Writer Rachel Lynn Brody is from Buffalo, New York, and is a student on the MFA Dramatic Writing course at Queen Margaret University College in Edinbugh. She is also the BTG's reviewer, so it may seem to be a bad conflict of interest for us to review one of her plays. On the other hand, wouldn't it be totally unfair not to review it, just because she works with us? That's the feeling I had, so I decided I should go along (on the first night) and write as unbiased a review as possible. It did help that Rachel and I had not actually met until the performance! Actors Stephen Stocking and Melinda Wright, along with director Joyce Stilson, are also from Buffalo and are the team responsible for the play's first performance in that city. It's a gently funny piece about two old friends ("best friends"), Sam and Beth, and what happens when Beth returns to Buffalo after working away in Los Angeles for a number of years. Sam, it transpires, is in love with Beth and, in the course of the play, reveals that love. She, however, does not reciprocate: to her, they are just "best friends". It's nicely performed, with two sympathetic and attractive characters, and shows, I venture to suggest, that Rachel does have a future as a playwright. She does make us care about these two nice people ("nice" is not a cop-out word: it sums them up!) but my feeling is that there was too little variation of pace, which is inherent in the writing, to really excite us. That said, it's a very pleasant way to spend just under an hour away from the angst of many of the Fringe offerings or the sometimes grim determination of others to be funny, or different, or both. And it's well worth the journey away from the Fringe epicentre to a part of Edinburgh which is a more like a real city than those parts which Fringegoers normally see! However it only plays until 14th, so you'll need to get in pretty quickly. Peter Lathan Son of the Father If any one person epitomises the best of the Edinburgh Fringe it is Pip Utton. A writer/actor, he has brought us Adolf, Resolution, Only the Lonely, Stone Me It's the Lad Himself and Hancock's Last Half-Hour. All are very different from each other (with the exception of the last two, which were played as a double bill in 1997) but all are gripping one-man pieces, characterised by deep understanding and superb acting. This year Utton has taken his work a step further: instead of his trademark one-man shows, Son of the Father is a two-hander, dealing with the immediate aftermath of Jesus' crucifixion and its effect on the relationship between Mary and Joseph, played by Mae Brogan and Utton respectively. That relationship is explosive, Mary having left Joseph and the rest of the family to support Jesus on his mission - indeed, according to Joseph she was the driving force behind that mission - and now Jesus is dead and Joseph, totally distraught, wants Mary to return to the family. Both actors give tremendous performances: Mary's almost manic devotion to the cause, Joseph's utter despair and feelings of rejection, and the huge gulf between the two who still, in spite of everything, love each other, are brought to painful life by two consummate actors. So why no five stars? There were times when, for me, the language did not sit easily with the style of playing, which is very naturalistic. In the extremely intimate surroundings of Pleasance Beside, every twitch of the features, even the smallest movement of the body, and the most subtle vocal inflection has an immediate impact, but the language, which is at times literary and not quite naturalistic spoken dialogue, just occasionally sounds off-key, not quite right. Perhaps the vast majority of people would never notice it: I don't know. But it's certainly a show not to be missed. Peter Lathan |
|
|