DOUBLE DOUBLE. To 10 August.
Southwold/Aldeburgh
DOUBLE DOUBLE
by Eric Elice and Roger Rees
Jill Freud & Company, Southwold Summer Theatre, St Edmunds Hall To 3 August 2002
Then Jubilee Hall, Aldeburgh 6-10 August
Mon-Sat 8.15pm Mat Sat 5pm
Runs 2hr One interval
TICKETS 01502 724441 (to 4pm) 01502 722389 (from 5pm) – Southwold
01728 453007 (to 4pm) 01728 454022 (from 6pm) - Aldeburgh
Review Timothy Ramsden 29 July
First-rate revival of a suspense play from the eighties.Michael Napier Brown's depth of experience shows every moment in this spot-on show: in the pacing, focusing of action, stage movement and characterisation. Regular Southwold designer Maurice Rubens matches this with his excellent set: a good-sized downstairs acting area, a vertiginous staircase (useful in making a late, coincidental contribution to the plot seem realistic) and, upstairs, arches and angled walls giving a sense of affluence and space to the London flat where the action passes. The moneyed background is vital to the plot. And plot is just about everything here.
Which isn't to deny the fine performance of Paula Stockbridge as the woman who brings a vagrant home, carefully spreading newspapers for him to step and sit on, touching his boots with refined distaste. Or of Michael Shaw, in the difficult-to-believe role of a down-and-out who's a poet and ex-lecturer. This is a fresh observation in a play from 1986, when the world of rough-sleepers was less explored. But the character's Scottishness seems plastic (Duncan McFee indeed) and his basic middle-class intelligence rather too convenient. It is, after all, for his looks that the lady's brought him home.
Philippa is the more interesting character. She's the one with all the hidden motivation and the controlling intelligence – his minor tricks of stealing an ashtray and cigarette-case are ones she almost scorns to observe. The pair's developing relationship could become more interesting than the plot-twists that have satisfyingly enough kept pulling carpets from under audience feet till way into act two. But the script never goes beyond generalised expressions of emotion. It's unsurprising the acting can't cover over these limitations – Stockbridge's emotional outbursts and Shaw's responses become correspondingly generalised.
In the end, how much you enjoy the play depends on the extent you buy into its premise, that it's possible to pass yourself off as a complete stranger on a chance look-alike. The writers refer to Pygmalion but don't put in their own spadework, confining the makeover mostly to the interval. Still, it will be hard to find a production that serves the play better than is being done at the Suffolk seaside.
Philippa James: Paula Stockbridge
Duncan McFee: Michael Shaw
Director: Michael Napier Brown
Designer: Maurice Rubens
Lighting: Ben Payne
Costume: Richard Handscombe
Sponsors: AKT – Corporate Training, The Amber Shop, Jennie Jones Estate Agents, John McLaren
2002-07-31 11:59:37