THE MAID OF BUTTERMERE To 18 April.
Keswick.
THE MAID OF BUTTERMERE
by Melvyn Bragg adapted by Lisa Evans.
Theatre By The Lake To 18 April 2009.
Mon-Sat 7.30pm Mat 28 March, 4, 18 April 2pm.
Audio-described 16 April.
Captioned 9 April.
Post-show Discussion 2 April.
Runs 3hr One interval.
TICKETS: 017687 74411.
www.theatrebythelake.com
Review: Timothy Ramsden 23 March.
A lot of plot and little else.
It’s pushing things to say this is about celebrity culture and identity theft. Yet both lurk around Lisa Evans’ adaptation of local author Melvyn Bragg’s novel based on incidents in the time when Wordsworth and Coleridge were the Lake District’s local literary lads.
They’re merely mentioned here; at the centre is conman John Hatfield, who assumes a lordship and arrives in Keswick to court a fortune called Amaryllis, before falling for Buttermere innkeeper Joseph Robinson’s famously beautiful daughter Mary.
Lisa Evans has adapted 19th-century novels successfully, finding a form that reflects their structure and underlying themes. Buttermere, however, defeats her. This lumbering three-hour show is a mere succession of events, crowded with incidents that allow characters little room to develop.
Money – important in a story where conmen are central - is difficult to track. Hatfield asks his accomplice, Howard Chadwick’s severe, black-clad Newton, for a fiver (a considerable amount in 1802). Later, Hatfield's apparently forking out £100 (or is it £50?) for his wedding to Mary. Subsequently he vanishes owing £28. Is that part of the £100 (or the £50)? Where did the money he paid come from? I think we should be told: clearly.
There’s a sizeable amateur (or ‘community’) cast, presenting another problem; not of quality but of participation. Repeatedly groups come on to establish a scene, showing lively expressions, pointing at things, and silently talking. Doing this, they create their own place in scenes, but it’s soon clear none of this will be followed-up because the rules don’t allow the unpaid to speak. So, interest’s repeatedly provoked and then stifled.
Central performances are generally adequate, though neither Rebecca Pownall’s Mary nor Jonathan Keeble’s Hope (Hatfield’s assumed name) go beyond the amiable to the charismatic. Claude Close and Tim Barker are their usual, dependable pillars of communities, Close also providing some life as Amaryllis’s guardian, moving from being flattered by a lord’s attention to self-exculpating denunciation of the revealed fraudster.
Evans tries for a governing frame in Mary’s relation with social outsider Kitty, but, again, the character’s never sufficiently established to bind the piece into a satisfactory play.
George Wood/Jester: Tim Barker.
Mrs Robinson: Janine Birkett.
Rev Nicholson/Toff/Judge Hardinge: Patrick Bridgman.
Newton: Howard Chadwick.
Joseph Robinson/Colonel Moore/Judge: Claude Close.
Richard Harrison/Toff/Gaoler: Liam Gerrard.
Hope: Jonathan Keeble.
Alice/Mitchelli: Catherine Kinsella.
Amaryllis D’Arcy/Anne Tyson: Frances Marshall.
Mary Robinson: Rebecca Pownall.
Kitty/Mrs Moore: Maggie Tagney.
Tim/Musician: Daniel Wexler.
Members of the community in Buttermere and Keswick: Mike Aldred, Heather Askew, Jonty Bouskill, Norman Brayton, Jennifer Collard, Claire Cooper, Frank Cosgrove, Louise Coulthard, Wadvern Davies, Tex Houjghton, Grace Kirby, Caroline Liversidge, Marc Jason McAdam, Mandy Norman, Edward Thompson, Ellie Blackley, Isabella Brownson, Eve Cowper, Isabella Eddington, Elie Kate Fanning, Hannah Fanning, Harriet Forsyth, Lotte Gale, Rachel Gale, Louis Grove, Annie Jackson-Elliott, Teddy Kemp, Emmeline Hazel Long, Jacob Longcake, Jessica Marsden, Kayleigh Peck, Hannah Piercy, Olivia Walker-Mister. Genevieve Webzell, Gregory Webzell, Bethyn Yates.
Directors: Ian Forrest, Stefan Escreet.
Designer: Martin Johns.
Lighting: Nick Richings.
Sound: Matt Hall.
Composer/Musical Director: Richard Atkinson.
Movement/Choreographer: Lorelei Lynn.
Dialect coach: Charmian Hoare.
Fight director: Kate Waters.
Assistant director: Anthony Middleton.
Design assistant: Oliver Townsend.
2009-03-28 11:15:59