NAN. To 2 June.
Richmond
NAN
by John Masefield
Orange Tree Theatre To 2 June 2007
Mon-Sat 7.45pm Mat Sat 4pm & 10, 31 May 2.30pm
Audio-described 22 May, 26 May 4pm
Post-show discussion 25 May & Thu mats
Runs 2hr 15min One interval
TICKETS: 020 8940 3633
www.orangetreetheatre.co.uk
Review: Timothy Ramsden 7 May
Unseen jewel in a production as near-perfect as can be.
This 1908 play (set in 1810) is a highlight of the Orange Tree’s ‘Shaw and his Contemporaries’ season. Auriol Smith’s devastating production soon digs beneath suggestions of stock mummerset misery to grip like the Pargetter women’s stranglehold on the life of orphaned relative Nan Hardwick.
Their pinched meanness varies between daughter Jenny’s false friendship (Amy Neilson Smith, flightily self-centred) and the calculating hatred of mother Kate (Kate Lock, sourly malignant), who exploits every chance to ruin Nan’s life. Set in the Pargetter cottage kitchen, the action sees mother and daughter bake and plot so Jenny can gain social position by marrying a man she doesn’t care for, and whom Nan loves.
There’s unfashionable poetic imagery, though nothing we wouldn’t take in Lorca. It burns into the mind as the initially well-disposed William (Stuart Fox, limping and ineffectual against his womenfolk) is set against Nan and her lover Dick Gurvil turned from her by Kate’s wheedling insistence on his financial prospects.
Behind all this is the disgraceful secret of Nan’s father; an injustice authority eventually sets right with brusque officiousness. Throughout, nobody cares for Nan, though her social stock rises when money arrives.
Author John Masefield (subsequently poet-laureate) tells his vividly-expressed story through mundane objects: a Toby Jug, a rotten-meat pie, while Smith’s cast earth any fanciful linguistic flights without grounding the play.
The tragedy has an ironic edge. Circumstances pile up to give Nan victim status. but her intensity, spellbinding in the love scene, trembling with hope, hands fiddling nervously with her dress, gazing piercingly at Dick (Edward Bennett, engulfed by desire that drains away within minutes – this actor’s grown in stature through this spring’s Orange Tree shows) finds unexpected violent release at her moment of apparent rescue from this hell-kitchen.
Dressed in green against others’ earthier colours, with a ruddier complexion than her enemies, Katie McGuinness catches Nan’s intensity through outspoken resentment, her tidal wave of love as a new life beckons, yet also the violence of a young woman in whom the passion for justice turns awry as it gains the name of action. This show’s magnificent throughout.
Jenny Pargetter: Amy Neilson Smith
Kate Pargetter: Kate Lock
William Pargetter: Stuart Fox
Nan Hardwick: Katie McGuinness
Dick Gurvil: Edward Bennett
Artie Pearce: Dudley Hinton
Gaffer Pearce: Trevor Martin
Tommy Arker: Paul O’Mahony
Ellen Roberts: Amy McAllister
Susan Roberts: Emily Rothon
Parson Drew: James Greene
Captain Dixon: John Paul Connolly
Horton: George Michie
Director: Auriol Smith
Designer: Jude Stedham
Lighting: John Harris
Fight director: Philip d’Orleans
Assistant director: Helen Leblique
Associate designer: Isabel Munoz
2007-05-09 07:51:28