THE QUEEN OF SPADES. In rep to 15 October.

Pitlochry

THE QUEEN OF SPADES
by John Clifford, from Pushkin and Tchaikovsky

Pitlochry Festival Theatre In rep to 15 October 2002
Mon-Sat 8pm Mat Wed & Sat 2pm
boxoffice@pitlochry.org.uk
Runs 2hr One interval

TICKETS 01796 484626
Review Timothy Ramsden 28 August

A handsome production of a sweeping account of individuals living through - or in despite of - historical change.Poor Michael Mackenzie. After playing a second-rate composer in Amadeus he now gets lumbered with a first-rate one who's dead.But it's a key role in John Clifford's rich mix of themes built around Pushkin's early 19th century story and Tchaikovsky's later operatic version, both bundled forward in this new play to the time of the 1917 Revolution.

Precise timing can seem unclear, but the main point comes across: that personal preoccupations carry on as regardless as possible of larger-canvas changes. A gambling-school bets on while Russian capitalism's undermined. The new age dawns among people ambitious within the past. And the mix can be destructive, as when fiery, irresponsible young Anton acquires his first automatic rifle in the turbulent time of revolution.

Personal passions and ambitions are what count with most people. Hermann, the officer back from the war in a private's coat (officers are getting the chop at the front), is disbelieved with his stories of Bolshevism. Only when Lenin turns up in his sealed train (somewhat clumsily narrated direct to us) do things begin to change.

At first Edith Macarthur's magnificent noble finds wartime's tiny privations - having to shut a door for herself - quite charming. She still feels in control, and has not had the events which shook her young life brought back to the surface - until her meetings with Hermann take her back to the night she bought the secret of victory at cards, at a heavy personal price.A price that involved sexual practices comparably forbidden to - if different from - those which destroyed Tchaikovsky. His Ghost's post-mortem sense of doom repeatedly recalls the ominous mood and story of his Swan Lake.

As the dead composer laments his nights with attractive young men, innocent young Lisa and her fortune are passed around a sex and marriage market where gay passions linger insolently under a veneer of conventional behaviour.

Clifford's symphonic variety also includes the uppity Scottish-voiced servant who seems aware Revolution's bringing her time around, while still sweeping the floors. She is the only one who welcomes the new age as a time of hope, while the previously great and their servants - a type enshrined in John Buick's splendidly heirarchical lackey - go on living out lives already condemned to history.

The female performances are generally the stronger, notably Macarthur's aristocrat, self-armoured against emotional vulnerability for reasons which, as they say, become clear. And Kitty Lucas presents a strong picture of intelligent honesty puzzled by self-serving duplicity all around. But what ultimately carries conviction is Patrick Sandford's clear exposition of the several elements Clifford weaves into his drama.

He's helped by Adrian Rees' set of onion-dome topped iconic pillars, revolving triangles that take us into the gambling hothouse of Russian society - its bad traditions under new pressures - out into its grand autumnal public prospects and finally to the blankness of the asylum where the fate that has haunted the acquisitive passions expressed especially through Herrman, deals out its punishment.

The first act finale is splendidly theatrical, its sweep of a society ball catching up individual emotions. The second act conclusion was untidy when I visited. But I suspect this new play will finally be the show of the 2002 Pitlochry season which continues to resonate in the mind.

Tchaikovsky's Ghost: Michael Mackenzie
Pyotr: John Buick
Anna: Lucy Paterson
The Countess: Edith Macarthur
Liza: Kitty Lucas
Anton: Matt Blair
Hermann: Guy Fearon
Yeletsky: Gavin Kean
Anyone else: Richard Keynes

Director: Patrick Sandford
Designer: Adrian Rees
Lighting: Mark Pritchard
Sound: Alan Jackson
Costume: Monika Nisbet
Choreography: Tony Ellis

2002-08-30 18:07:42