SHADOWLANDS. To 23 February.
London
SHADOWLANDS
by William Nicholson.
Novello Theatre To 23 February 2008.
Mon-Sat 7.30pm Mat Thu & Sat 2.30pm.
no performance 24-25 Dec, 21, 28Jan, 4 Feb.
Runs 2hr 35min.
transfer from Wyndhams Theatre.
TICKETS: 0870 950 0921.
Review: Timothy Ramsden 9 October.
Life as a shadow land lit up by Joy.
I came out of William Nicholson’s Shadowlands (originally a mid-eighties TV play), surprised by joy. As was the play’s subject, Oxford don C S Lewis. It was the title of one of his books, taken from Wordsworth, a shockingly modern source for an academic versed in Medieval and Renaissance allegories.
Nicholson deploys two aspects of Lewis, his Christianity and a remarkable ability to communicate, to simplify without becoming simplistic. It’s there in the religious allegories of his Narnia novels, but was also evident in books and broadcasts that expressed theological concepts in the manner of a fireside chat. As with Pope’s Horace, Lewis could, “like a friend, familiarly convey, The truest notions in the easiest way.”
He does so in Nicholson’s opening moments, explaining suffering in a world created by a good God. Then again, he’s living a comfortable, detached 1950s academic life, seen in the clubbable post-dinner common-room chat among academics. Wit, irony and good-temper prevail in this cohesive, limited world of muted colours.
After the interval, Lewis talks again. The difference is immense. Now he’s engaged with the suffering of another surprising Joy, American Joy Davidman whom Lewis has met, married with casual secrecy on a suitably damp day to allow her to remain in England, and whom he learns to love deeply, in sickness as in health.
Janie Dee is fine as Joy, though her face expresses more than the words that show her a match for any old-world professor. But Charles Dance’s Lewis is the core of the evening, expressing the ease and humour of the early scenes where he has no inkling what’s to come over him, in his polite, energetic yet slightly uneasy manner, with its fidgets of hand and voice.
This merges into the commitment of the man in love, for whom the capacity to suffer is a part of that love. For this is at heart a love-story, rational and unsentimental. And it’s blessed with a clutch of strong performances, notably John Standing’s Riley, a melancholy wit whose calm, dry way through life, joy of any description is unlikely ever to trouble.
C S Lewis: Charles Dance.
Dr Maurice Oakley/Doctor: Osmund Bullock.
Professor Christopher Riley: John Standing.
Alan Gregg/Priest: Drew Mulligan.
Rev Harry Harrington: Graham Padden.
Major W H Lewis: Richard Durden.
Waiter: John Harwood.
Woman/Registrar: Sioned Jones.
Douglas: Christian Lees/Jonah Lees/Adam Megginson.
Joy Davidman: Janie Dee.
Witness/Nurse: Naomi Paxton.
Registrar’s Clerk: Adrian Fear.
Director/Sound: Michael Barker-Caven.
Designer: Matthew Wright.
Lighting: Peter Mumford.
Assistant lighting: Rachael McCutcheon.
2007-10-11 09:11:28