The Stage and
Television Today 19th July 2001, Valerie Grosvenor Myer
Joe Orton has been dead for 35 years and his
cynical amorality has lost much of its power to shock. Having seen only
sluggish productions of his posthumous play, I was unconvinced of its merits.
Jeremy Sams’ immaculate version, superbly staged and performed at breakneck
speed without loss of clarity by a distinguished cast at the Arts (Cambridge),
is an eye-opener.
Orton’s reiterated theme is the abuse of power, and
the core of this dizzying farce is satire on the psychiatrist who imposes his
partial and wrongheaded interpretations of human behaviour on other people. As
Rance, Benjamin Whitrow, with the trace of a Viennese accent, is sinister as
well as comic. Michael Pennington is Dr Prentice and Jane Asher his elegant
wife. As Geraldine, innocent victim of Prentice’s lustful manipulations, Kate
Alderton is fresh and touching. The blackmailing pageboy is played by Edward
Clarke and David Cardy is Sergeant Match (though why no stripes on his
uniform?). This is team playing of the highest order, with superb timing.
After the gunfire and bloodshed, the farce
transmutes into a Freudian romance of incest and long-lost relatives, drawing
on the archetypes from classical tragedy which preoccupied the author. The set
by Robert Jones is technically brilliant. The psychiatrists, when the shutters
come down, are caught in a trap of their own making. The famous fire escape is
here a stairway between heaven and earth, as suggested by Orton’s partner
Halliwell. The final climb suggests redemption for the characters.
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