THE STORY OF VASCO. To 25 April.
London.
THE STORY OF VASCO
by Georges Schehade in a version by Ted Hughes.
Orange Tree Theatre To 25 April 2009.
Mon-Sat 7.45pm Mat Sat 3pm & 2, 9 April (+ post-show discussion).
No performance 13 April.
Audio-described 31 March, 4 April 3pm.
Runs 2hr 30min One interval.
TICKETS: 020 8940 3633.
www.orangetreetheatre.co.uk
Review: Timothy Ramsden 30 March.
Another unexpected Orange Tree discovery.
There’s quite a role for the little man in 20th century theatre, with Brecht conscripting Jaroslav Hasek’s Schweyk into the Second World War, or Tankred Dorst adapting Hans Fallada’s 1932 Little Man, What Now? for the Bochum Schauspielhaus in the early 70s.
Vasco, is more of an innocent than the sly Czech. A barber, he’s called-up to the army, marching fancifully away with his parasol in the belief he’s going to cut the Commander’s hair. In fact, as the surrounding crows (this is Ted Hughes’ version, and a free one at that) suggest, he’s off on a suicide mission. His lover follows into the war zone.
This could be a heart-pounding love-story, or an earnest denunciation of war. But though writer Georges Schehade was Lebanese, born in Egypt, he moved to France where he fell among Surrealists. It shows.
“Meanwhile, inside the tree…” one scene’s titled. The play opens in a night-time forest, where Caesar’s wagon is stuffed full of stuffed dogs. His daughter Laura suddenly conceives a love for Vasco, whom she’s never seen, after his name’s been mentioned.
Dreams – or nightmares, fairy-tale like events and a moonlit forest; Vasco doesn’t operate in the real world. Or, not in the world of perceived reality, as its sergeants or generals go around in trios (in one case, as a trio of trees; in another in female disguise).
Such wild imaginings display the absurdity of war. And when we’ve laughed at it, the ebbing mirth leaves a bitter image of sacrifice and bereavement as the simple barber, who’d wanted to be left alone to live his life, lies surrounded with roses by the lover who’d never set eyes on him.
“The pallor of girls’ brows shall be their pall,” Wilfred Owen wrote of the Great War dead; and the innocent responses of the only female here form the play’s moral register. Laura Rees plays this with supreme clarity, as does Jonathan Broadbent’s Vasco with his mix of trust and self-sacrificing stratagem. In the end, Adam Barnard’s sympathetic production makes clear, these two are the victors, apart from the death and bereavement.
Mrs Hillboom/Sergeant/Hans/Berberis/Gregory: Tobias Beer.
Troppo/Sentry/Braun/General/Fritz: Robert Benfield.
Vasco: Jonathan Broadbent.
Rondo/Mirador/Paraz/General/Kranz: Richard Heap.
Corfan/Sentry/Latour/Caquot/Aldo: Michael Kirk.
Caisar: Richard O’Callaghan.
Marguerite: Laura Rees.
September/Alexander/General: William Tapley.
Director: Adam Barnard.
Designer: Sam Dowson.
Lighting: John Harris.
Music: Peter Michaels.
Assistant director: David Siebert.
2009-03-31 12:02:20