PEER GYNT. To 13 October.
Dundee
PEER GYNT
by Henrik Ibsen New version by Colin Teevan.
Dundee Rep Theatre To 13 October 2007.
Tue-Sat 7.30pm.
Runs 3hr One interval.
TICKETS: 01382 223530.
www.dundeereptheatre.co.uk
Review: Thelma Good 6 October 2007.
Humour and grotesqueness powerfully fused.
Dominic Hill’s last production at Dundee Rep before he becomes Artistic Director of the new writing theatre The Traverse in Edinburgh, is a fine parting gift and the Traverse should get ready to be reinvigorated and refocused by Hill’s tenure. In this co-production with the National Theatre Scotland he has commissioned a new version of Peer Gynt from Colin Teevan and has some fine additions to the very strong Dundee ensemble. These include several RSAMD undergraduates, the very watchable Gerry Mulgrew as the older Peer and the blond, ethereal Cliff Burnett, almost always on stage as the Buttonman who reveals at the end he has a voice you might willingly die to.
Don’t be in a rush to sit in your seat, for this production is strongly linked into our world and arrives outside the theatre. It’s inventive pre-wedding party takes over the bar area, then draws the audience into the auditorium. Right from the off the audience are engaged by Hill’s direction, the energy and conviction of the cast, the zest and direction of Teevan’s text and the skilful underscoring of the action by Paddy Cunneen’s music. The script is full of surging rhythms and the f-word, which in the context of this play sounds entirely right and far from gratuitous. Teevan would like to update Shakespeare too; I look forward to that.
This is an updated Peer Gynt and its punchy dynamic text gives rise to many well-tuned scenes. There’s Keith Fleming’s young Peer meeting with Helen Mackay’s arrestingly innocence Solveig, a woman who waits for him with pure thoughts in her heart. Then comes Fleming’s increasingly disturbing encounter with the weirdly sensual Woman in Green, Gail Watson and her father King Bastard, Robert Paterson. In the second half Peer’s older, wealthy and living in Africa being interviewed by Irene MacDougall’s sharp interviewer.
In the centre of Ibsen’s play is the challenge of being human – how should we live? This production, played on a stripped-back stage confronts and startles the audience into examine themselves in scenes where the humour and grotesqueness are powerfully fused. There’s intense laughter released in scenes which are extraordinarily macabre yet astonishingly funny. By the end you may find Ibsen’s wild, amazing theatrical journey, so well rendered in the reach and thrill in this production and version, has changed you.
Boy/Troll/Monkey/Madman: Duncan Anderson.
The Thin Man: John Buick.
The Buttonman: Cliff Burnett.
Mountain Girl/Anitra: Nailah Cumberbatch.
Peer Gynt: Keith Fleming.
Solveig: Helen Mackay.
Aslak: Kevin Lennon.
Boy/Troll/Monkey/Huhu: Darran Lightbody.
Kari/The Interviewer/The Priest: Irene MacDougall.
Girl/Mountain Girl/Troll/Helga: Sharon Young.
Mads Moen: Martin McCormick.
Boy/Troll/Madman/Monkey/ Hussein/Steward: Anthony Missen.
Peer Gynt: Gerry Mulgrew.
King Bastard: Robert Paterson.
Boy/Troll/Monkey/Madman: Jeremiah Reynolds.
Aase: Ann Louise Ross.
The Woman in Green: Gail Watson.
Girl/Mountain Girl/Troll/Madwoman: Judith Williams.
Ingrid/The Doctor/The Stranger Passenger: Emily Winter.
Director: Dominic Hill.
Designer: Naomi Wilkinson.
Lighting: Chris Davey.
Sound: Mark Cunningham.
Music: Paddy Cunneen.
Choreographer: Janet Smith.
2007-10-10 11:25:45