AMADEUS: till 9 August

York

AMADEUS
by Peter Shaffer

Theatre Royal To 9 August 2003 Tues-Sat 7.30pm
Runs 2hr 50min One interval

TICKETS: 01904 623568
Review: Timothy Ramsden 23 July

A boldly confident production with fine central performances.
Last year, Pitlochry revealed an unsuspected intimacy in Peter Shaffer's story of Antonio Salieri long-lived, successful court composer suspected of poisoning young genius Mozart in 1791 Vienna. Now, Tim Luscombe's York production, given a production of epic economy on Steven Yull's red curtain set, reveals the play's vitriol.
Five layers of rich red, these curtains fly apart or swing together like angrily purposeful angels, revealing or trapping Salieri in his fight with God.

At its centre, old Salieri eventually dying takes us back across 3 decades and more. Malccolm Rennie suggests, then eventually shows clearly, the pent rage fuelling his compulsive account.

Muddying the waters with fake confession of feeding his rival arsenic, he shows a much subtler, slow-acting poison. Apparently befriending the beloved of God (Amadeus') he blocks his career, reducing him to poverty and fatal illness. But Mozart is merely a reed-instrument blowing in Salieri's fury, a magic flute' blown by God. The key moment comes when the old man sees Mozart's manuscripts. Like Shakespeare's scripts they have no crossings-out or alterations.

Salieri's own pact with God, offering a virtuous life in exchange fo musical uccess is ripped apart. For this young man is foul-mouthed, libidinous, frivolous. Mozart even shrugs off composing as easy. Which it is; for God speaks through him. Another key moment arrives as Salieri listens to a Mozart performance. Rennie's face becomes beatifically rapt before turning to agony, and he collapses as if he had just heard the musical face of God.

His eternal smile, increasingly at odds with his growing malevolence towards the god of music and the God he's worshipped, creates its own growing unease. It clicks unnervingly into place at he few humorous moments is Salieri's discourse. Luscombe allows no let-up. Daniel Hart'a piping-voiced Mozart is annoying though it's a pity shiny-lime costumes and neutral performances reduce the influential courtiers' individuality, and therefore their various forms of power.

And the omen are blowsy parasites of court culture. Hoisting he skirt go get a favour from Salieri for Wolfgang, giggly and coarse as her hubby, Charlotte Parry bravely evades any sense of sentimentality in a performance that's unusually vivid. When the flurrying red curtains shift aside to set dying Mozart's impoverished slum in cold light against the theatre's dark wall, her agonised loss is terrifying in the context of her previous behaviour.

Venticello I: David Delve
Venticello II: Andrew Leonard
Antonion Salieri: Malcolm Rennie
Count Johann von Strack: Philip Rham
Count Orsini-Rosenberg: Nigel Hoyle
Baron Van Swieeten: Mark Payton
Constanze Weber: Charlotte Parry
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart: Daniel Hart

Major-Dono/Valet: Anthony Houghton
Emperor Joseph II: Adam Astill
Katherina/Cook: Jenni Maitland
Citizens/Servanttttts etc: Marissa Anderson, Tony Crosbie, Sonia Di Lorenzo, Hugh Dower, Martin England, Clare Glendenning, Pamela Penny, Will Roberts, Frances Rourke, Laura Tosney, Samuel Valentine, Aimee Ward, Alexandra McKenzie Willcox

Director: Tim Luscombe
Designer: Steven Yull,
Lighting: Richard G Jones
Sound/Original Music: Matthew Bugg

2003-07-29 09:57:37