JOKING APART. To 7 September, then Tour.
Scarborough/Tour
JOKING APART
by Alan Ayckbourn
The Round, Stephen Joseph Theatre In rep to 7 September 2002 Then tour
Eves 7.30pm Mat Sat 2.30pm
Runs 2hr 20min One interval
TICKETS 01723 370541
Review Timothy Ramsden 18 July
An intriguing new even modernist look at a well-known Ayckbourn comedy.They say context is everything, and it seems so here. Ayckbourn's revived this 1978 comedy to accompany his new comedy-thriller Snake in the Grass (the title crops up as a phrase in the earlier play, when Brian's girlfriend of the moment, Mandy, ominously describes a shape in her drawing). The pairing makes this seem a far darker play than it's previously appeared.
Partly, that's physical. Snake's creepiness asks for a garden design that suggests deviousness and secrecy, divided into small segments at different levels (in both plays much of the significant action takes place on the stepped area of the stage). It isn't the wide-open space suggested in Joking, where the point is that Richard and Anthea's extensive property has eaten up most of the former vicarage lawns.
Ayckbourn's use of the tennis-court in Snake means it's aptly shoved into a corner (theatre-in-the-round staging also encourages this). As a result, the comedy of boastful Sven's match against the suavely successful Richard is removed from view. And the first scene, set on November 5, is played in low-intensity blue lighting, with firework colours confined offstage: an opening designed to set up every resistance to laughter.
Structurally the play covers the four seasons at four-year gaps. In Scarborough's authorial revival the action seems drained of anything like plot. So, we glimpse the (unseen) children's development through reports of maladjustment and disaffection, but the stages are all separate.
Across his characters, Ayckbourn gives us fragments of action, and the results of interaction, as complacently benevolent Richard and Anthea slowly stifle life out of their neighbours and associates.
David Leonard's Richard, destroying business partner Sven's initiative, then crushing his self-esteem through absolute niceness, catches all unawares - a sinister edge (not for nothing is he York's loveable panto baddy). Fiona Mollison's Anthea smiles with blithe incomprehension as Adrian McLoughlin's vicar seethes with unbidden love for her. This couple are kindness itself but clueless if you don't stick to their agenda.
In a regulation ace Scarborough cast, Paul Raffield's slow-crumbling Sven and Rachel Atkins as his physically thickening, ego-feeding wife Olive are outstanding.
Richard: David Leonard
Anthea: Fiona Mollison
Louise: Susie Blake
Hugh: Adrian McLoughlin
Brian: Kenneth Price
Melody/Mandy/Mo/Debbie: Georgina Freeman
Sven: Paul Raffield
Olive: Rachel Atkins
Director: Alan Ayckbourn
Designer: Roger Glossop
Lighting: Mick Hughes
Costume: Christine Wall
Music: John Pattison
2002-07-24 15:59:05