ION. To 1 June.

London

ION
by Euripides translated by Stephen Sharkey

Gate Theatre To 1 June 2002
Mon-Sat 7.30pm
Runs 2hr 10min One interval

TICKETS 020 7229 0706
Review Vera Lustig 27 May

Curate's-egg production of one of Euripides' problem plays.Is Ion a satirical comedy or a tragedy? Its plot contains elements of the Oedipus myth: a foundling, Ion, who has been kept in ignorance of his parents' identity, with potentially fatal consequences. There are echoes of the Medea story: an embittered queen who, feeling supplanted in her husband's love, seeks revenge. But the ending is happy…ish, and the gods are portrayed as manipulative and skittish.

Euripides has dispensed with unity of tone, or at least that's the feeling one gets from this production. Stephen Sharkey's translation scales the heights of passion, but also seems to make obeisance to the present Jubilee with the inclusion of a couplet from the National Anthem. While the minimalist setting of varnished red wooden catwalk and panels (representing friezes, for we are outside Apollo's temple), plays safe by suggesting neither anachronistic modernity nor antique majesty, the acting is a pick 'n' mix of modes. It ranges from an intensely physicalised, balletic style through to the amiably suburban, reminiscent of Alan Ayckbourn's plays.

Ion opens auspiciously with Mark Lockyer's Hermes, dinky wings sprouting from his ears, presenting us with the exposition: all sinuous, flicky gestures and chatty, teasing direct address to individual audience members. By contrast, Ion (Sam Kenyon) is a good-natured, rather dweeby youth, his new-found royal father (Michael Brophy) a sturdy northerner in the Barrie Rutter, Northern Broadsides manner, while as the supposedly childless queen Creusa, Suzanna Hamilton cuts a handsome figure, a gruff Guardian-reading type.

When I saw the show, something went awry in the second half. In what should have been a tense, propulsive scene, with Creusa plotting her revenge, the production faltered, stumbled and lost momentum, never quite regaining it. Rushing breathlessly into this torpid scene, Mark Lockyer's second incarnation, as the statutorily horrified Messenger, seemed emptily histrionic.

Just one performance consistently hit the right note. The wide-eyed Melissa Collier, as a royal attendant/chorus, was always 'in the moment', watching and listening with unflagging, impassioned concentration. She was my guide through the production's uneven terrain.

Hermes/Messenger: Mark Lockyer
Ion: Sam Kenyon
Chloe: Melissa Collier
Daphne: Lara Marland
Creusa: Suzanna Hamilton
Xuthus: Michael Brophy
Old Tutor: Alfred Hoffman
Pythia: Susan Porrett

Director: Erica Whyman
Designer: Soutra Gilmour
Lighting: Simon Opie
Sound: Michael Oliva

2002-05-31 11:51:54