ON THE ROCKS. To 26 July.
London.
ON THE ROCKS
by Amy Rosenthal.
Hampstead Theatre To 26 July2008.
Mon-Sat 7.30pm Mat Sat 3pm & 16 July 2.30pm.
Audio-described 19 July 3pm.
Captioned/Post-show Discussion 22 July.
Runs 2hr 40min One interval.
TICKETS: 020 7722 9301.
www.hampsteadtheatre.com
Review: Timothy Ramsden 1 July.
Relationships plateau and crumble in serious new comedy.
While the Somme burned, conscientious objector and medically unfit novelist D H Lawrence and critic John Middleton Murry walked the Cornish coast where Lawrence and his German wife Frieda rented a cheap cottage, with Murry and partner Katherine Mansfield staying. Lawrence had notions of an ideal community. But it had to fit his ideas and moods; a near-impossibility.
Fifty years on from 1916, Lawrence would be lionised by literary criticism, while New Zealand-born short-story writer Mansfield held a respected minor status. Now, his star’s descended into the loins he wrote so much about, while she’s recognised as the genius she’s called by Murry during one of their tenser moments in Amy Rosenthal’s new play.
Rosenthal’s title refers to the Cornish coastline where Frieda’s taken for a spy, while locals merrily plunder a U-boat wrecked ship, and to the state of characters’ relationships. The play’s seriously humorous about these, and about the diffidently English Murry’s (Nick Caldecott captures him beautifully with his smooth manner, wearing a knapsack like one unaccustomed to outdoors, speaking with a silk-covered rationality) with Lawrence.
Ed Stoppard’s wiry frame and bearded features concentrate this explosive character, keeping sufficient sympathy while revealing how self-absorbed he is. Tracy-Ann Oberman’s Frieda, chatting inconsequentially about her German air-ace cousin currently shooting-down British pilots, matches him, despite an apparent reasonable surface. Their passionate rows and gropings (full-length on the floor while Murry looks away and Mansfield brings the tea) reveal them as two of a mutually-interdependent kind.
That paradox in relationships runs through the play. Rosenthal’s dialogue is natural-seeming yet purposeful, while she uses comic action to make points – a party game, wrestling-bout (Lawrence is writing Women in Love) or Frieda nibbling a cake before going to solace Lawrence. Mansfield’s the least showy character, but Charlotte Emmerson perfectly embodies her dignity and perception.
Director Clare Lizzimore orchestrates the action expertly on a useful, if crowded set (a place for everything, but hardly space for anything). And, having taken a title from Bernard Shaw, the production illustrates the play’s point about symbols such as Lawrence’s phoenix by adopting Stravinsky’s Firebird between the scenes.
John Middleton Murry: Nick Caldecott.
Katherine Mansfield: Charlotte Emmerson.
Frieda Lawrence: Tracy-Ann Oberman.
D H Lawrence: Ed Stoppard.
Director: Clare Lizzimore.
Designer: Paul Burgess.
Lighting: Jon Clark.
Sound: Edward Lewis.
Dialect coach: Sally Hague.
Fight directors: Scott Graham, Stephen Hoggett.
Assistant designer: Nikoletta Szedenics.
2008-07-02 11:40:57