ABSURD PERSON SINGULAR. To 2 April.
London
ABSURD PERSON SINGULAR
by Alan Ayckbourn
Upstairs at The Gatehouse To 2 April 2005
Tue-Sat 8pm Sun 4pm
Runs 2hr 10min One interval
TICKETS: 020 8340 3488
Review: Timothy Ramsden 27 February
Tragic tinges colour the comedy.A lot can happen in a year. Between the successive Christmas Eves of Alan Ayckbourn's 1972 comedy Sidney Hopcroft goes from eager parvenu to local business bigwig, Geoffrey Jackson from confident to near unemployable architect while bank-manager Ronald sinks further into his mire of confusion. And that's only the men.
Sidney's wife (in the play's home-town, Scarborough, audiences expected married couples) Jane is the only character to comment on how she's changing, yet she changes less than anyone else. Of the other women, one descends into suicidal despair then recovers bright and clear, while the other sinks from commanding heights to drunken depths.
It's all part of a speeding-up of time begun early on as the Hopcrofts' kitchen clock advances the minutes more rapidly on stage than in the audience. That fits the first act's farcical manner. This kitchen is somewhere people back into from the offstage party. As the acts proceed, various kitchens end up with the most manorial becoming effectively a cold prison-cell.
Alexander Holt's production plays up the darker side. The bitter final image, where Sidney has the others dancing to his call turns into a dehumanised hell's-kitchen nightmare. Yet Keith Faulkner begins as a reasonable, if ridiculous person, his yellow shirt (topped by eye-offending tie) matching Jane's yellow-rubber gloves.
Initially, Sidney stands apart from the other, more established, men as they talk of women. But it's the boastful Geoffrey who's put in his place, while Sidney repeatedly undermines his wife's self-confidence. Clare Wilkie points up Jane's one moment of smiling confidence as she assures him all women like kitchens.
Performances vary in their level of attack and technical flexibility, making Holt's production amusing rather than hilarious. Gaye Brown leads with the chin from her first entrance as the magisterial Marion, already tracing the first steps down her alcoholic spiral. Kevin Colson stays in a fug of comic unawareness throughout. As so often the Hopcrofts come off well, the Jacksons are most difficult to focus. Some lines lose their comic point through over-realistic phrasing. But the revival clearly shows Ayckbourn's been a serious dramatist from the start.
Sidney Hopcroft: Keith Faulkner
Jane Hopcroft: Clare Wilkie
Ronald Brewster-Wright: Kevin Colson
Marion Brewster-Wright: Gaye Brown
Eva Jackson: Amanda Beckman
Geoffrey Jackson: Greg Donaldson
Director: Alexander Holt
Designer: Katy Tuxford
Lighting: Racky Plews
Costume: Damar Morell
Assistant lighting: Elle West
2005-02-28 11:59:46