THE TRAGEDY OF THOMAS HOBBES. To 6 December.
London.
THE TRAGEDY OF THOMAS HOBBES
by Adriano Shaplin.
Wilton’s Music Hall Graces Alley, Ensign Street E1 8JB To 6 December 2008.
Mon-Sat 7.30pm Mat Sat 2pm
Audio-described 6 Dec 2pm.
Runs 2hr 45min One interval.
TICKETS: 0844 800 1118.
www.rsc.org.uk
Review: Timothy Ramsden 19 November.
Hobbled by Hobbes and hung-up on Hooke.
There’s a mix of well-known and forgotten names among the dramatis personae of Adriano Shaplin’s boisterously ambitious new play for the Royal Shakespeare Company’s winter Wiltons season. That causes problems as the line between familiar and unknown will doubtless differ for many in an audience: Newton: certainly. Hobbes: probably. Boyle: perhaps, sort of. But Statler, Waldorf (with neither hotel nor saladic links)? Shaplin does little to make the territory clear.
What we don’t know about Hobbes, we’re unlikely to find out. His most famous work, Leviathan has already been published but it’s never transparent why it is causing controversy. Nor, as events move from the God-centred strictness of Cromwell’s Protectorate into the lax days of Charles II and the daylight of the painfully established Royal Society with its scientific outlook, is the point of Hobbes’ presence, in title or play, fully explained.
Perhaps the point lies in the way the religious quarrels of Cromwell’s age are echoed in scientific rivalries, while it’s debatable whether Roundhead absolutism or Cavalier arrogance makes for less desirable government. Cast doubling throws up piquant contrasts, between Peter Shorey’s humourless Cromwell and camp, condescending Cavalier, or Arsher Ali’s disputatious Leveller Lilburne and insolent, camp monarch.
There’s physical excitement as figures dash around the three levels of Soutra Gilmour’s scaffolding set, though Elizabeth Freestone’s production ends up like Shaplin’s script, running away with itself as figures move frenziedly around for the sake of theatricality rather than anything clearly related to the script.
Jack Laskey’s young Robert Hooke increasingly becomes central to the scientific rivalries, breaking from the patronage of the older Boyle (played, inexplicably, by the sole woman in the cast). There’s the theme of a new generation breaking through here, as there is in the arrival of Isaac Newton, though his portrayal sets moments of physical energy against a blank personality; this Newton seems no Einstein.
The whole scene, from whorish actors to insolent royalty, suggests less an imaginative participation in mid-17th century England than the recreation of the rough histories of Edward Bond, Howard Barker and others. We have been here, rather often, before.
Cromwell/Cavalier: Peter Shorey.
Lord Broghill: William Beck.
John Lilburne/Charles II: Arsher Ali.
Statler: Leonard Fenton.
Waldorf: Larrington Walker.
Robert Boyle: Amanda Hadingue.
Rotten: Angus Wright.
Robert Hooke: Jack Laskey.
Thomas Willis: John Paul Connolly.
John Wilkins: Keir Charles.
Black: James Garnon.
Thomas Hobbes: Stephen Boxer.
John Wallis: Simon Darwen.
Christopher Cox: Adrian Decosta.
Isaac Newton: Will Sharpe.
Director: Elizabeth Freestone.
Designer: Soutra Gilmour.
Lighting Johanna Town.
Sound/Music: Adrienne Quartly.
Movement: Anna Morrissey.
Text and Voice work: Stephen Kemble.
Fights: Terry King.
Dramaturg: Jeanie O’Hare.
2008-11-23 14:57:04