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Nick Curtis's rating
Refuge for the desperate in Alphabetical Order
By
Nick Curtis
22 Apr 2009
At his best, Michael Frayn is the most humane, sensitive and intelligent of writers. This excruciating 1975 comedy does not show him at his best.
It’s not the setting — a newspaper cuttings library — that makes the play seem so dated. Or the idea newspaper employees can be selfish and stupid. It’s the suggestion that a collection of infantile caricatures could be funny.
The play won an Evening Standard award for best comedy on its first appearance at this address. Maybe comedy has moved on in 34 years even if newspapers haven’t, much. Either way, Christopher Luscombe’s hollow revival for Hampstead’s 50th anniversary season does the author, theatre, cast and audience few favours.
On her first day on an ailing, regional paper, young Lesley (Chloe Newsome) is apprenticed to the much-loved but scatter-brained Lucy (Imogen Stubbs). The ordered world of the library has slipped into chaos. The desperate, drunk and intellectually randy seek solace there and in Lucy’s martyred embraces, sexual or otherwise. Worse (ho, ho) the filing’s gone awry.
The first half has an aura of forced bonhomie, as various Grub Street stereotypes try to impress Lesley and us. “You don’t think we’re this loveable normally, do you?” Lucy says after a concerted display of sexism, indifference, arrogance and baby talk from the staff parading by. Sorry? In the second half, heartiness gives way to ear‑shredding hysteria as Lesley’s attempts to impose order come crashing down and the characters begin to behave in an even more unbelievably brattish fashion.
Frayn’s linguistic dexterity and intellectual playfulness is squandered in the mouths of idiot stereotypes. The author himself seems unsure if he’s mourning the passing of a gentler age or greeting a brave new, hard-edged professional era. I don’t even think the play has a symbolic dimension. The two-dimensional characters are what they are. Luscombe directs with technical proficiency but can’t give it warmth or more than sporadic life.
Newsome’s robotic Lesley, Gawn Grainger’s monosyllabic roué Arnold and Ian Talbot’s relentlessly chirpy messenger Geoffrey are cyphers. But the role of Lucy is a trap for Stubbs, tempting her back into all the brittle, honking, head-girlish, eye-rolling tics she has fought so long to lose. By the end, she’s yelping like a puppy.
That’s the problem with so many ill-conceived anniversary revivals. It reminds you of the least, rather than the best, all concerned are capable of.
Until 16 May (020 7722 9301).
Details are correct at the time of publication - please check with venue before booking.
Reader views (1)
I agree with Nick Curtis. In fact I left after the first half as I was bored. I thought it was very dated and the performances reminded me of a rather bad Am Dram production. The characters were portrayed as shallow and uninteresting, and I didn't find it funny at all. I would agree that it was cringeworthy, despite the Guardian review, which heaped praise upon the production, and, for some inexplicable reason, gave it four stars. I think sometimes a play by a big name like Michael Frayn provokes a reaction akin to the Emperor's New Clothes - we feel we should like it because of who wrote it, but the fact it, the production was dull and without imagination, and, as Nick Curtis pointed out, the characters were cardboard cut-out stereotypes.
- Suzanne Senior, Edinburgh, Scotland, 23/04/2009 23:32
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