Theatre 2017: Review Eight - The White Devil

The White Devil, Sam Wanamaker Playhouse, Shakespeare's Globe, London. February 2017.

The Sam Wanamaker Playhouse really is the perfect place to see these wonderful Jacobean revenge tragedies. The eerie lighting really does let the evil of the plots shine through.

The White Devil was wonderfully nasty (in the best way) within this setting. The playhouse was dimly lit at the start and at first it was hard to work out who all of the characters were but as more candles were lit it became clearer to work out who was who and then the absurdity and evil really shone through, and as the play drew to a close the candles were put out and the room grew darker as the madness drew to a close. I don't think that the candles have been used to greater effect in anything I've seen in this location.

Vittoria is unhappily married - her family arranged this to save their own reputation and finances - and pursued by Bracciano who seems to love her despite being married himself.  We also have a scheming brother who will do anything, including pimp his sister, to advance his position, a disgraced Duke who will do anything to get back into the good books and then there's the corrupt cardinal and his lackey.

It is a revenge tragedy so no spoiler to say that by the end of the play the stage is littered with corpses - all of whom the audience doesn't really grieve over. And some of the deaths are wonderfully staged and incredibly amusing to watch. At the start I was concerned that the darkness of the plot wouldn't emerge as there seemed to be much overplaying of the crude humour but, like the lighting, this all just helped to show the true nature of the characters.

Since coming out of the Playhouse I've been discussing the play on and off with Rebecca and the Upstart Wren and like the best things I am liking it more and more.  As I said there are no characters that you admire wholeheartedly but unlike so many plays from this era I find Vittoria to be a believable and strong female lead. She is manipulated and used by all around her and yet throughout this production she remains strong and dignified, her crime is to fall in love with a man who is not her husband and then be caught up entirely in the wider politics of the time.

Unlike Rebecca I didn't dislike Bracciano completely, he is an out and out cad but he is also being manipulated by forces that he doesn't quite appreciate. His fickleness was played superbly and in the end he did seem to love Vittoria, however short their union was!

The true villain for me was Flamenio who had no care for anyone and would do anything to get what he wanted, the way he was played on stage actually made my skin crawl slightly.

On reading the programme on the train home I've learned that this production has cut text from the original and reassigned lines so I am now off to read Webster's original and see how it compares...

Theatre 2014 - Review Forty

'Tis Pity She's A Whore, Sam Wanamaker Playhouse at Shakespeare's Globe, London. December 2014.

It was a very cold and damp December day when Bec and I went to London to see this, and to be honest after our experiences at the SWP earlier this year we didn't go in with high hopes.  The Duchess of Malfi was good, but the seats that time were very uncomfortable, Knight of the Burning Pestle was fun but over long and felt forced by the end and the Young Player's version of The Malcontent was frankly a disappointment and over priced.

This was a different experience entirely, I am not sure if we accidentally picked the best seats in the house or what but we had a good view and missed very little of the action at all and didn't find ourselves wriggling too much to stay comfortable.

The key thing is however that this play was fantastically acted - the space of the theatre was used completely and the scene where all the candles were extinguished was spooky - far more so than in the Duchess of Malfi.  I still can't decide if this play was actually bloodier than Titus Andronicus earlier in the year, or if it just seemed so because the playhouse is so much smaller and we were so close to the action.  No pies in this production but a bloody heart on a sword was waved around for much of the last act!

The only thing I didn't like about this play was the feeling that I couldn't discern what John Ford was actually trying to say.  The Catholic Church certainly came across as corrupt, and sleeping with your sister will drive you insane but I'm note sure beyond that.  The way I 'read' the performance Annabella was almost coerced into sleeping with her brother, and that every time she tried to repent he bullied her back into his arms yet why she should be castigated and called a whore is beyond me.  Politics of the time I guess.  I found it interesting that the audience hissed more as the one anti-Semitic line the play but laughed when the woman was called a whore.  Something to think about and investigate further I feel.

I am pleased that we had a good experience at the Sam Wanamaker Playhouse finally, and I am pleased that we have got tickets to one more thing there this winter season.  I do look forward to their first full Shakespeare in the venue however and without wishing my life away hope that that will be a feature of the 2015/16 season!

Theatre 2014: Review Fifteen

The Malcontent. The Sam Wanamaker Playhouse, London. April 2014.

The Malcontent is almost an experiment by the SWP/Globe as it is performed entirely by children/young adults - like the boy players of Jacobean times.  If it is taken as an experiment then that is all well and good however this was staged, and priced, as all of the other plays this season have been and that is where I have a slight problem.

On the whole the actors were good, the costumes fine and on the whole you could hear all of the voices.  But they weren't, and possibly shouldn't have been, as good as the professionals.  They were a little self conscious, you couldn't tell if pauses were dramatic or where lines had been forgotten and they just weren't as good at the little stage actions that make a play special.  There was also the problem that when you couldn't see the actor it often wasn't possible to tell who was speaking (male or female) due to the unbroken voices.

However that sounds a very harsh review and the more I think about it the more the good parts did come through. I am not alone in this uncertainty about the play as after the interval an awful lot of people in all areas of the theatre did not come back - the first time I have seen this at the Globe or SWP.

I think that many of the problems I have are actually with the theatre space itself.

I said after seeing The Duchess of Malfi that I didn't think there was enough space to sit comfortably in the high priced seats of the upper gallery.  This problem isn't so noticeable in the side sections of the mid or upper galleries however and so I know know to avoid these.

However these more comfortable seats to the side in the upper gallery give such a restricted view that probably a third of the action is missed, plus a lot of what happens in the pit.  From here you are also looking through the candles and it was only afterwards that I notice how uncomfortable this was and both Rebecca and I attribute our headaches to this.

The seats we had for The Knight of the Burning Pestle, to the side of the lower gallery, were very good - if you can be at the back or front and have something to lean on.

I love the physical space of the Sam Wanamaker Playhouse and I appreciate that in an inaugural season there are things to work out (between my first and second visits for example the slightly padded carpeted benches have been recovered with much softer cushions) but after three plays - one excellent, one good and one okay - I think that I will probably return to try it again but only if I can get the exact seats I want.

Theatre 2014: Review 9

The Knight of the Burning Pestle, Sam Wanamaker Playhouse, London. March 2014.

The last play of the weekend was at the beautiful Sam Wanamaker Playhouse and this time I had a much more comfortable seat - they've improved the cushions and there seems to be more space in general in the lower gallery.

The Knight of the Burning Pestle  was a contrast to all that we'd seen previously and as different from The Duchess of Malfi as can be imagined.  It is a play within a play and then some.

Players are trying to stage their melodrama but a 'citizen' in the audience is not entirely happy about this and insists that his apprentice should have a role. Once poor Ralph has a part the citizen and his wife spend the rest of the play trying to make his role bigger and thus subvert the normal play.

It could be a total mess, and to be honest by the end I'd given up trying to follow what plot there was, but for me it didn't matter as it was so funny, and well acted, that I'd have gone along with anything. Occasionally the ad libs and interactions with the audience felt more 21st century than early 17th but that aside it was fun. Pantomime for grown ups in the best sense and a nice way to finish the weekend.

Three plays, a visit to the British Library, a visit to the British Museum, nice food and a glorious walk along the sunny South Bank was a lot to cram into just over 36 hours but so worth it.  Time to start planning the next mad weekend I think...

Theatre 2014: Review Two

The Duchess of Malfi, Sam Wanamaker Playhouse, London. January 2014

I've been excited about this play for a long time, and even more so since I have been studying the theatres of the Jacobean era and first of all let me say that this didn't disappoint.

Over the past few years I've seen the outside of the new Playhouse take shape on visits to the Globe and I've also been following in the interior build thanks to the photos posted by The Globe on their website. A quick Google search shows the stages of the build and it has to be said that the CGI projections of what the finished building looked like were accurate but don't do it justice.

Inside it is like travelling in time (except thankfully without the aromas!) the theatre is all made of wood and lit with beeswax candles that are on movable chandeliers as well as some fixed candle sticks on the pillars.  Actors also carry candlesticks with them as they move about the space. The candles are also lit and extinguished throughout the performance so there is the lovely smell of wax and smoke at times too!

Now the play. I saw the Duchess of Malfi in 2012 and liked it very much, although looking back now I remember incidents and the Duchess clearly but the rest of the play and the actors have faded completely from my memory.
The version at the SWP managed to be physically lighter than the version I saw before, despite using no modern lighting. This made the impact of the darker scenes greater as you really noticed when the mood changed, it also meant that the characters themselves were more visible and I found all of the roles easy to distinguish and keep track of. Seeing the actors all of the time also meant that I got into the rhythm much quicker.
The flickering light and small space made the play feel very claustrophobic (in the right way) as an audience member you were complicit in the action and could see every small flicker of emotion on the characters' faces.

The horror scene however wasn't as effective in this version, I had forgotten when it occurred in the play but just didn't buy into the scene at all. However I did have many more goosebumps running up and down my arms throughout the play and it was scarier over all.

This version also lost a lot of the carnality I remember from the version at the Old Vic, however this did mean that we saw the action unfold rather than have it told to us.  Ferdinand's unhealthy obsession with his sister and descent into madness were much clearer in this version, and thoroughly creepy.

It was nice to see some of the main Globe's actors in a smaller space, and also to see similar styles of theatre from the open air stage scaled down but still visible in the new space.

However the new theatre isn't without problems, it feels cramped even after making use of the cloakroom. Leg room is an issue and Mr Norfolkbookworm with his long thigh bones was very uncomfortable. The Globe have always said that no seat in either of their Playhouses has a totally unrestricted view of the stage this is more true in the indoor theatre than ever. We had a very good view of the stage from our favourite area at the back of the Upper Gallery but even leaning forward we couldn't see the pit (unlike at the outdoor theatre) and seeing as the standing spots are twice the price of the Groundling area (listed on line as having the best view for only £5) the view from them appeared to be dreadful.

None of this has put me off, I'm going back in about 6 weeks to see the next Jacobean play performed. I loved the play and the playhouse but with a few reservations about the seating.

This images from Reuters gives a feel for the interior...