MASTERPIECES: Words and Music of Coward, Birmingham Rep till 15 June

Birmingham

MASTERPIECES: Words and Music of Noel Coward
Birmingham Rep: Tkts 236 4455: Info www.birmingham-rep.co.uk
Runs: 2h 10m, till 15 June
Review: Rod Dungate, 1 June 2002

Fairly standard Coward repertoire: well performed but offering little to excite, surprise or see anew.I suppose the idea is that Masterpieces is going to make a lot of money for someone – whether it's the Coward estate, the Birmingham Rep, or deviser-directors Christopher Luscombe and Malcolm McKee you can't tell, perhaps all three. If you like an easy-listening kind of compilation of Coward bits and pieces to make you feel all warm and cosy then this is for you. If, however, you expect theatre (and in particular a major highly subsidised regional rep theatre) to produce new or unusual work, or to take fresh looks at standard works, then this will leave you cold.

The whole thing feels not so much as if the Rep has turned the clocks back, but more as if they've got stuck in a 1930s time warp.

A talented company of eight performers sing and dance their way through a pretty standard Cowardian repertoire offering no new, serious insights into either Coward's work or life. To be fair, there are moments when the work tries. A touching scene takes place between two young men, one of whom invites the other to swim 'because I like you, you know how much I like you'. Shortly afterwards two women sing the first two verses of Mad About the Boy, a man sings the third. The audience found this the funniest thing up to that point in the first half. And at that moment any attempt at making serious points gave up the ghost and died.

High spots are stand alone numbers – in particular Michael Siberry's highly spirited Don't Put Your Daughter on the Stage and Rula Lenska's wonderfully off-hand bitch I Went to a Wonderful party. Low spots are excerpts from Coward's plays where, because the extracts are out of context, actors fall back on signalling emotions and pulling grotesque faces.

Over the past few years an important reassessment of Coward and his work has taken place: we view the plays differently and find new insights. Luscombe and McKee must have been in hibernation.

Cast
Helen Anker
Gillian Bevan
Michael Cahill
Jane Gurnett
Clive Hayward
Gavin Lee
Rula Lenska
Michael Siberry

Devised and Directed: Christopher Luscombe and Malcolm McKee
Design: Tim Goodchild
Lighting: Howard Harrison
Choreography: Jenny Arnold
Sound: Rick Clarke

2002-06-03 20:02:21