OUR LADY OF THE DROWNED. To 8 July.

London

OUR LADY OF THE DROWNED
(Senhora dos Afogados)
by Nelson Rodrigues

Southwark Playhouse Southwark Bridge Road SE1 0AT To 8 July 2006
Mon-Sat .730pm Mat 24 June, 8 July 3pm
Runs 1hr 50min One interval

TICKETS: 08700 601761
www.southwarkplayhouse.co.uk
Review: Timothy Ramsden 17 June

Rare chance to see impassioned drama.
If a scenario of Nelson Rodrigues’ 1947 play had come into the hands of a West End playwright of the day, it could have turned into a neat thriller. Set in the home of a judge, yet within hearing of dockside prostitutes, the story involves the 19-year old murder of one of the dock women, the deaths of 2 sisters in the judge’s household and passionate relationships turned, or turning, sour.

But Brazilian Rodrigues wasn’t interested in plot tension. Discoveries slip out to help understanding of characters and their relationships, the loves and hates that bind or split families. The world is much more that of Lorca than Agatha Christie, and this StoneCrabs’ production at Southwark Playhouse makes an intriguing prologue to the Arcola’s Lorca summer season.

The intensity of the loves and hates here match the Spanish dramatist, but Rodrigues is even more complex in the deceptions brought about by the needs of conformity to social and traditional patterns of behaviour. The wailing of the harbour prostitutes, having a day off to mourn the one killed 19 years before, is heard in judge Misael’s house with good reason. And the women’s long-remembered mourning signifies how injuries never disappear in this world.

Kwong Loke’s production uses glass screens to give the sense of separation between locations in Southwark Playhouse’s intimacy. With videos floating on the panes, and the space behind giving glimpses of prayer, dancing and observation of some characters by others, there’s a true hot-house feel.

Thank goodness companies and theatres like StoneCrabs and Southwark Playhouse (about to move to new, temporary premises later this year, while awaiting a permanent home at the Elephant and Castle) are opening up such unfamiliar repertory to British audiences. Yet production and most performances are stretched; there’s a cut-down, derivative look to some of the behind-screen movement. Performances are mostly decent, though some require quite a bit of indulgence.

However, Tereza Araujo gives the mother Eduarda a sense of emotional complexity as apparent liberation lets her down, while Bronwyn Lim’s surviving sister would be very chilling if her intensity had more vocal force.

Eduarda: Tereza Araujo
Grandmother: Ruth Posner
Misael: Livy Armstrong
Moema: Bronwyn Lim
Paulo: Alistair Gillyatt
Comb Salesman/Neighbour: Ian Keir Attard
Fiance: Patrick Ross
Neighbours/Prostitutes: Louisa Tuesday Ulyatt, Naomi Waring

Director: Kwong Loke
Designer/Costume: Kimie Nakano
Lighting: Adam Crosthwaite
Sound: Dinah Mullen
Video: Matthew Deely

2006-06-19 09:32:06