MOTHER TERESA IS DEAD. To 13 July.

London

MOTHER TERESA IS DEAD
by Helen Edmundson

Royal Court, Jerwood Theatre Upstairs To 13 July 2002
Mon-Sat 7.45pm Mat Sat 4pm
Signed 5 July
Runs 2hr 30min One interval

TICKETS 020 7565 5000
Review Timothy Ramsden 3 July

A bundle of themes that never spring into dramatic life.Edmundson, responsible for some sophisticated novel adaptations, has come up with a straightforward discussion play; the air is heavy with the beat of hearts worn on sleeves.

There are times directness is called for. But you wonder why it takes two and a half hours to arrive at the silent, not over convincing, hand-holding accord of the four previously battling characters.

Only the last minute revelation by Anglo-Indian Frances that her family spent a time in Russia, where a journey's preceded by a couple of minutes' contemplation, brings about this conclusion. A convenient sojourn for the playwright, and a chance for director Simon Usher to do what he does best here – direct silences. They contain complex character interactions the dialogue cannot match.

Neither Edmundson, nor Diana Quick's efficient performance, makes Frances a vivid character. She's mainly a fulcrum bringing Mark, yer typical post-Thatcher Essex (probably) man, for whom there's no such fing as society, just ambition for yer own family, to India in search of his runaway wife. She, Jane, has been seduced by charity leaflets of the world's dispossessed – though she faces further seduction from Harry Dillon's coolly pompous charity-manager.

Personal desires repeatedly obtrude: English xenophobia, maturity's jealousy of youth, male rivalry over a woman. This last bursts out into a fight at a point whose precision will be an object lesson to playwrighting workshops.

Which is the play's problem, only highlighted by the quality acting. John Marquez works hard to put an understanding moral drive, however limited, into the anguished pursuing husband, making a subtle most of the moment Edmundson professionally allows him when, in a night scene, his wife bathes his injured face.

Maxine Peake gives a terrific portrait of someone clenched-up by conscience, the realisation her home-life is nonsensical in a world of poverty amid plenty. Her guilt works itself out in imaginings of child-buying and murder.

Edmundson's play is open to the allegation it uses the subcontinent as background to a drama of white Western concerns. And more open to being called over-schematic with its themes not spun into life through fully-realised characters.

Frances: Diana Quick
Mark: John Marquezt
Srinivas: Harry Dillon
Jane: Maxine Peake

Director: Simon Usher
Designer: Anthony Lamble
Lighting: Paul Russell
Sound: Ian Dickinson
Dialect coach: Jeannette Nelson
Company Voice work: Patsy Rodenburg

2002-07-04 11:32:52