MARY BARTON. To 14 October.
Manchester
MARY BARTON
by Elizabeth Gaskell adapted by Rona Munro
Royal Exchange Theatre To 14 October 2006
Mon-Fri 7.30pm Sat 8pm Mat Wed 2.30pm & Sat 4pm
Audio-described 30 Sept 4pm (+ Touch Tour 3pm)
BSL Signed 7 Oct 4pm
Post-show discussion 21Sept
Runs 2hr 45min One interval
TICKETS: 0161 833 9833
www.royalexchange.co.uk
Review: Timothy Ramsden 15 September
No doubt here of the author's qualities; but does it make for a drama?
After her triumph with a modern French-Canadian play in Edinburgh this year playwright Rona Munro's done very well by Elizabeth Gaskell, adapting her 1848 debut novel to bring out its rich strands. Industrial strife is handled with a spread of understanding: trade unions as organised altruism against Dickensian individual benevolence, the despair of poverty, the way inequality stifles human sympathies. Munro also makes clear the 'rattling good yarn' elements: knife-edge moments, a race against time, as well as characters' tough choices. Add a presciently comic anticipation of celebrity 'culture' and there's plenty to justify paying attention to Mary Barton.
Whether a theatre's the best place to do so remains doubtful. Alongside Munro, director Sarah Frankcom does a splendid job, with fine performacnes and economy of set-changes between the often brief scenes. But the stage can't cope with a factory fire, despite the coup of canvas 'walls' flopping from the flies. Voices shouting all around just won't do, especially when scene (and scenery) falls flat at the end as things scurry on to the next event.
Similarly, having Mary overturn an empty oblong wood box, last used as a coffin, to represent the small boat in which she chases a sailing-ship seems merely feeble. Scene ends are particularly vulnerable. A full-stop in print or a film edit doesn't leave bodies around to remove themselves with invented purposes or in semi-obscure visibility, impacting adversely on the production's rhythm.
Gaskell was a very local writer; husband William was unitarian minister just across the road, and there's no doubt this Victorian vicar's wife had a powerful mind, wide social vision and strong human understanding. Designer Liz Ascroft enforces this with her graveyard setting, culminating in boss and unionist talking sympathetically as they sit over the dead. But however much Ascroft surrounds the action with cotton (a link to the Exchange's trading past), it's a pity the theatre's 30th anniversary couldn't have been celebrated with an actual play (Harold Brighouse's industrial drama The Northernerscould have fitted the bill).
But in a strong cast there are 2 undoubted highlights. Kellie Bright's Mary gives reality to statements that might now seem naive and makes every dilemma and feeling rise from an individual heart and mind. And Penny Layden is outstanding as Margaret. Gradually blinded by her work, firmly independent, Layden's Margaret has a lightness which keeps mawkishness at bay yet expresses sweetness as well as strength of temperament. It could hardly have been better done, if it's to be done at all.
Mary Barton: Kellie Bright
Esther/Sophie Carson: Lucy Black
John Barton: Roger Morlidge
Young Tom/Sally/Beggar: Hannah Storey
Jem Wilson/Jack: William Ash
George Wilson/Carson: Will Tacey
Harry Carson/Will Wilson: Toby Sawyer
Jane Wilson/Miss Simmonds: Christine Mackie
Margaret/Helen Carson: Penny Layden
Job/Policeman: David Sterne
Slater/Policeman: Patrick Bridgman
Director: Sarah Frankcom
Designer: Liz Ascroft
Lighting: Richard G Jones
Sound: Peter Rice
Music: Olly Fox
Dialects: Mark Langley
Fights: Kate Waters
Assistant director: Chris Meads
2006-09-16 13:39:29