ONE FLEW OVER THE CUCKOO'S NEST. To 3 June.
London
ONE FLEW OVER THE CUCKOO’S NEST
by Dale Wasserman based on the novel by Ken Kesey
Garrick Theatre To 3 June 2006
Mon-Sat 7.30pm Mat Thu & Sat 3pm
Runs 2hr 30min One interval
TICKETS: 0870 890 1104 (booking fee £2.50max per ticket)
Review: Timothy Ramsden 1 May
You’d have to be mad to miss it.
Casts this size aren’t supposed to happen in commercial theatre these days. But following a first run in 2004 this production returns, still with Christian Slater as wild-card patient McMurphy in the asylum ruled by Nurse Ratched. She’s now played by Alex Kingston, her vivid red lipstick suggesting a sexual luxury denied by the crisp, immaculate white uniform.
The point about Ratched is, she believes in what she’s doing. The asylum day-room becomes a microcosmic utopia, where ills are kept at bay by attacking individuality through tranquillisers, electro-therapy or lobotomy. And its inmates, McMurphy aside, are voluntary admissions.
At first Kingston’s Ratched, in her unbending way, is sweet control itself, seeking to accommodate her new patient. Challenged by him, she switches to threat, then provocation, aimed at obtaining authorisation of more severe treatments. To achieve this, she has to surrender her composure, first as McMurphy tears away her uniform, then as she ends up with another patient’s blood all over her crisp white perfection.
Christian Slater’s a bundle of fiery anarchy (if, as Slater makes clear, sometimes a carefully calculating one) subverting procedures, stirring up the men to self-assertion. What that means is losing to him at cards and holding a small-town orgy when he sneaks a couple of women-friends in one night. For such a controlled community he may be what the doctor ordered, but it’s not a prescription to take for long, leaving the patients stuck between a dictator and a demagogue.
It’s part of the period’s easy optimism that the native American Bromden, recovering self-confidence, sets off on a long journey barefoot through the city. But the opposition of order and anarchy, with the latter tending to be less democratic than it first seems, is an intriguing theme, as is the struggle of a community to organise itself.
Terry Johnson and Tamara Harvey achieve fine performances throughout, Owen O’Neill’s head of patient council Dale and Paul Ready’s repressed Billy in particular. Above these people blue skies are seen, rather obviously converting at one point to cogs in a machine, a literalism acting of this quality doesn’t need.
Chief Bromden: Brendan Dempsey
Aide Warren: Cornelius Macarthy
Aide Williams: Felix Dexter
Nurse Ratched: Alex Kingston
Nurse Padua: Rebecca Grant
Dale Harding Owen O’Neill
Billy Bibbitt: Paul Ready
Frank Scanlon: Gavin Robertson
Charles Atkins Cheswick III: Alex Giannini
Anthony Martini: Ian Coppinger
Ruckly: Alan Douglas
Randle Patrick McMurphy: Christian Slater
Dr Spivey: Simon Chandler
Candy: Lizzie Roper
Sandy: Katherine Jakeways
Directors: Terry Johnson/Tamara Harvey
Designer: Katy Tuxford
Lighting: Chris Davey
Sound/Composer: Matt Clifford
Costume: Dagmar Morell
Voice coach: Majella Hurley
Fight director: Terry King
Associate costume: Yvonne Milnes
2006-05-08 00:47:26