Tag Archives: Edward Albee

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“The Goat, or Who is Sylvia?” at the Theatre Royal Haymarket

This first London revival of Edward Albee’s 2002 play, with Ian Rickson directing a stellar cast, reveals a piece that is riveting and risqué. A superb companion to Albee’s Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?, playing around the corner, it’s also a marital drama with high stakes. Our hero is having an affair… with a goat.

There’s a lot of shock value, cleverly handled. Albee plays with taboos in a fashion that would make younger writers from the ‘In Yer Face’ school proud. The nervous laughter of the audience would be gratifying to him. The language is colourful and its articulate characters – caught in a nightmarish situation – explore all manner of repercussions to the affair.

The cast are superb. Jason Hughes and Archie Madekwe stand as fully formed characters, best friend and son to Martin and Stevie Gray, the couple whose perfect lives didn’t contain a plan about what would happen in the face of zoophilia. It’s a bizarre twist – that’s the point – Albee even describes it as “ludicrous”.

Damian Lewis takes the part of Martin: great as the tortured victim of his obsession and even better when it comes to trying to defend his actions. Sophie Okonedo plays his unfortunate wife, giving a magnetic performance of subtle comic skill. Together they create a believably perfect marriage – think how difficult that is – that roots the show in a painful reality. And the life we see falling apart needs to be convincing: it is important Martin’s obsession is a bolt from the blue.

When the truth is revealed, the objets in the couple’s stylish apartment suffer during an amusingly respectful fighting match (credit to designer Rae Smith here, but also a busy stage management replacing all those broken pots). Martin the “semanticist” tries to pin down what’s going on – to describe facts and feelings. His odd forgetfulness and obsession with grammar are not just for laughs, and Lewis makes them edgy; showing the “pit” of chaos that’s arisen from a chance encounter in a farmyard! With admirable gusto, Rickson orchestrates a swirling mix of trauma, hilarity and shock – making this an awesome experience.

Until 24 June 2017

www.trh.co.uk

Photo by Johan Persson

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“Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?” at the Harold Pinter Theatre

Casting doesn’t get more exciting than this. For the first revival of Edward Albee’s masterpiece since his death last year, Imelda Staunton and Conleth Hill take on the iconic roles of George and Martha, the feuding couple whose frustrated lives on a New England college campus are full of twisted alcohol-fuelled fantasies. Imogen Poots and Luke Treadaway, as the younger Honey and Nick, join them for a party – unfortunates drawn into troubled lives for a fight night they will never forget. The stage brims over with talent for this astounding play.

George and Martha’s “exercise” of combat is frightening. Their aim at one another is practised and potent, themed on his stagnant career and her drinking and adultery. Their “games” escalate ferociously – and they start out pretty vicious. Staunton and Hill convey the complicity between the couple perfectly, who display a mix of resignation and excitement over their perverse sport. The final scene, revealing who is really the most damaged, shows how carefully constructed both performances have been. Yet it is the younger cast who offer the most insight into the play. The 1966 film shows how easily these roles can be eclipsed, but Honey and Nick are more than sacrificial pawns. Potts and Treadaway work to create a convincing relationship, a foil to their elders. Potts does a great drunk (never to be underestimated) and Treadaway adds an edge to his “smug” character with cold ambition and repressed physicality.

Luke Treadaway and Imogen Poots
Luke Treadaway and Imogen Poots

Yet the production is not an unqualified success. It’s too funny. Yes, Albee’s text is full of wit but here the humour is blunted and misogyny unquestioned. Director James Macdonald hasn’t mistakenly stumbled into his approach and clearly gets what he wants – big belly laughs. But it is a disappointment. Take a moment of physical violence (noting how rare and strange it is) and Honey’s reaction to it: Potts gets a roar of laughter but this should be a moment of raw bestiality. Macdonald has stripped the play of surreal touches, such as George’s ironic obsession with order. Deliberate mistakes, over job titles, locations and dates, are treated glibly when they should be unsettling. Too much of the comedy is treated as sparkling and fresh – it should be fetid and uncomfortable. George and Martha’s “flagellation” is sordid stuff, but here it feels like a drawing room comedy.

Until 27 May 2017

www.whosafraidofvirginiawoolf.co.uk

Photos by Johan Persson

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“A Delicate Balance”at the Almeida Theatre

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Edward Albee’s A Delicate Balance is the story of an elderly couple whose twilight years are disturbed by an alcoholic sister-in-law, a daughter’s failed marriage, and their best friends’ nervous breakdowns. A thought-provoking meditation on the duties of family and friendship, as well as an examination of the American dream, this is a fantastic piece of writing that’s ambitiously broad, but so intelligent and challenging that it is always absorbing.

Albee’s observations are inspired. Often more startling than sure-footed, they can jolt an audience to attention. Agnes and Tobias, the elderly couple in whose house we, and all the characters in the play come to stay in, form the focus of observations on age and gender. Agnes fears that she will come “adrift” in senility and claims her husband’s life has been easier than hers – all men have to worry about is “making ends meet until they meet the end”.

Unfortunately, the writing here is far stronger than the production. Albee has created a stifling social world of guarded conversations, full of innuendo, but director James Macdonald does it little justice. Desperation is conveyed too quickly, with no sense of the slide into apathy.

This fault matters less with characters clearly on the edge. Harry and Edna are the best friends who seek refuge due to their inexplicable fear. Diana Hardcastle’s panic is conveyed superbly, likewise her battle to stay and claim the ‘rights’ of her friendship with Agnes. Imelda Staunton plays Clare, the alcoholic sister-in-law, with wit and perspicacity.

Tim Pigott-Smith (Tobias) in A Delicate Balance at the Almeida Theatre. Photo by Hugo Glendinning
Tim Pigott-Smith as Tobias

But the production falters with its central characters and the talented cast never satisfactorily deals with Albee’s articulacy. Penelope Wilton’s Agnes is too magisterial and Tim Pigott-Smith’s Tobias always so close to a breakdown it is hard to imagine him as the conventional man he has always seemed to be.

The skeletons in this family’s closet are so easily exposed you wonder if the wardrobe door was ever closed. Macdonald’s indelicate production destroys Albee’s cleverly constructed rhythm – too much weight is given to calls to activism and not enough to either the humour or humanity of the piece.

Until 2 July 2011

www.almeida.co.uk

Photo by Hugo Glendinning

Written 13 May 2011 for The London Magazine