RELATIVELY SPEAKING To 20 June.
Manchester.
RELATIVELY SPEAKING
by Alan Ayckbourn.
Library Theatre To 20 June 2009.
Mon-Thu 7.30pm Fri-Sat 8pm. Mat Thu & Sat 3pm.
Audio-described 11 June 7.30pm, 13 June 3pm.
BSL Signed 10 June.
Captioned 18 June 7.30pm.
Runs 2hr 10min One interval.
TICKETS: 0161 236 7110.
www.librarytheatre.com
Review: Timothy Ramsden 26 May.
Early Ayckbourn ingenuity still plays well.
In his first commercial success Alan Ayckbourn contrasts two generations and states of affluence, linked by an extra-marital affair; ingredients he would famously conflate in the simultaneous settings of his next success How the Other Half Loves.
The earlier play is also a hymn to the significance of the personal pronoun. The misunderstandings which elaborate when Ginny comes to tell Phillip to stop pestering her, unaware suspicious boyfriend Greg is going to arrive at what he thinks is her parents’ house, would collapse if anybody used a name rather than a “him”, “her” or whatever at a crucial moment. The skill lies in it all seeming perfectly natural at the time.
Like a deceptively simple Mozart piano piece, the script actually needs great subtlety and shading in performance. Director Chris Honer paces and weights it aptly, and Judith Croft’s settings provide the garish period feel of the young love-nest and the stately rural stagnancy of a detached house called The Willows. Ayckbourn pictures both the innocence of middle-class youth of the day, and the dead respectability of an evidently stale marriage, which makes for a hint of darkness when Sheila predicts the young lovers planning to get married are clearly wrong for each other.
All that prevents Honer’s often amusing production becoming hilarious (as the play did in the author’s own revival a couple of years back) is an unevenness between individual performances. Lucy Tregear is precisely right as Sheila; contained, polite, concerned even when not understanding a thing that’s happening, and quietly able to control the situation when she does. Only her final triumphant gesture at leaving her philandering husband perplexed is too open and externalised.
As the philanderer Malcolm Scates tends to signal points with gestures which he’s already making clear with face or voice. But it’s a decent comic performance. As the younger pair Leila Crerar also tends to be over-explicit with externals of acting – the thought processes underneath can become obscured. While Simon Harrison’s Greg could settle down vocally to advantage, he has a promising sense of pace and manner that helps in this capable revival.
Greg: Simon Harrison.
Ginny: Leila Crerar.
Phillip: Malcolm Scates.
Sheila: Lucy Tregear.
Director: Chris Honer.
Designer: Judith Croft.
Lighting: Nick Richings.
Sound: Paul Gregory.
2009-05-31 14:19:57