OLEANNA. To 17 July.

London

OLEANNA
by David Mamet

Garrick Theatre To 17 July 2004
Mon-Sat 7.45pm Mat Wed & Sat 3pm
Runs 1hr 40min One interval

TICKETS: 0870 890 1104
Review: Timothy Ramsden 23 April

Power-play takes time to reach full force.Let's hope audiences don't still divide on gender lines for David Mamet's 1992 play in which a female student alleges various offences against her male tutor, up to a rape charge. A lesser dramatist might have made this a simplistic issue play; Mamet explores Lord Acton's all power corrupts' syndrome and shows how set mindscapes damagingly conflict.

Still relevant? Last month I heard a sacked lecturer ring a 'phone-in and talk about the way female office-staff couldn't take a joke. Not his joke, anyway. One man's jest is another person's harassment, and a job's lost with grievances all round.

John commits at least eight unprofessional acts in the first of the play's three scenes. He's inconsiderate, confusing (mixed messages always offer trouble), over-confident and ill-equipped to deal with a student answering back. Students are adults, and they're not friends or relations. You don't bar the way to the door when they've decided it's time to leave. For all John's liberal, humanistic beliefs, in his world he's the one who makes the definitions.

How bright is Carol? Very bright, he says, gerrymandering the assessment system. But she doesn't understand very much. An Idea in someone who can't think for themselves easily signs such a person up to the notion of the day, reinforced by the conviction of group consent. When the notion has enough sense to gain credence on high, there's trouble ahead. Years after Oleanna came the challenge of institutional racism political correctness to some, but born out of a brutal murder.

So, Oleanna has a lot to say, but this production takes time to start its pronouncements. Aaron Eckhart has the look of a youngish teacher still climbing the professional pole, but an unvarying fierceness that does little to suggest a reflective academic, or to make a sympathetic character.

Things improve when Julia Stiles' Carol takes the lead. Even her initial reserve has suggested the toughness ahead. It's rare a West End leading role of a US college student could be played by a US college student. Here it is, and by one with a thoughtful dramatic presence too.

John: Aaron Eckhart
Carol: Julia Stiles

Director: Lindsay Posner
Designer: Christopher Oram
Lighting: Howard Harrison
Sound: Mic Pool
Fight director: Terry King
Voice coach: Patsy Rodenburg

2004-04-26 00:54:48